Topic: How To Invest

Dividend Advisor Hotline – Friday, November 25, 2016

Article Excerpt

MICROSOFT CORP., $60.53, Nasdaq symbol MSFT, is the world’s largest software company. Its Windows operating system powers about 90% of the world’s personal computers. The company will raise its quarterly dividend by 8.3% with the December 2016 payment, to $0.39 a share from $0.36. The new annual rate of $1.56 yields 2.6%. Microsoft also expects to complete its multi-year plan to buy back $40 billion of its shares by the end of 2016. As a result, it has authorized a new $40 billion share repurchase plan. That’s equal to 9% of its $465.1 billion market cap (the total value of all outstanding shares). There are no time limits for those purchases. In the fiscal 2017 first quarter, ended September 30, 2016, the company’s revenue rose 3.1%, to $22.3 billion from $21.7 billion a year earlier. Earnings gained 5.8%, to $6.0 billion from $5.7 billion; due to fewer shares outstanding, earning per share rose 8.6%, to $0.76 from $0.70. Research and development expenses have increased…