TSI’s Scott Clayton has identified seven leading U.S. and global aerospace and defence companies helping power NASA’s Artemis program. Each one offers durable, income-generating potential backed by strong dividend sustainability. As featured in our Globe and Mail exclusive, we applied our rigorous 12-point Dividend Sustainability Rating System to uncover companies combining reliable payouts, financial strength, and diversified revenue streams beyond space exploration.
These standout firms span the aerospace and defence ecosystem. They range from prime contractors building spacecraft and launch systems to technology leaders supplying propulsion, communications, navigation, and onboard life-support systems. Whether it’s the company behind Orion’s crew module, suppliers of rocket engines and boosters, or firms delivering critical avionics and thermal controls, each plays a vital role in returning humans to the moon—while maintaining established, cash-generating businesses here on Earth.
Our screening began with companies directly contributing to NASA’s Artemis missions, then narrowed to those with proven dividend track records and resilient operations across defence, aviation, and industrial markets. This broader exposure helps reduce reliance on any single program while supporting steady income through varying economic conditions.
TSI’s Dividend Sustainability Rating System evaluates each company on key criteria: consistent dividend payments (with added weight for long histories and recent increases), management’s commitment to shareholder returns, stability across economic cycles, limited exposure to external risks, strong balance sheets with manageable debt, and reliable earnings and cash flow to support payouts. We also reward companies that hold leadership positions in their industries, reinforcing long-term competitive advantages.
Excerpt from theglobeandmail.com, April 16, 2026
Sustainable dividends from companies that gave the Artemis II mission a boost.
Last week, as part of its Artemis II mission, NASA’s Orion capsule, with four astronauts on board, travelled around the moon and back – a test run of all its functioning systems.
The Artemis II mission was a key step for NASA, laying the groundwork for a planned moon landing—the first since 1972.
Major Artemis II player Boeing suspended its dividend in 2020. Nonetheless, there are several ways to invest in the program and earn dependable dividends from other contractors working on the mission’s systems. Better still, they have other well-established sources of revenue to cut your risk.
Our search focused on dividend-paying Canadian and U.S. companies contributing significantly to the Artemis program. We then applied our TSI Dividend Sustainability Rating System to those with the most attractive prospects for growth. Our system awards points to a stock based on key factors:
- One point for five years of continuous dividend payments
- Two points for more than five
- Two points if it has raised the payment in the past five years
- One point for management’s commitment to dividends
- One point for operating in non-cyclical industries
- One point for limited exposure to foreign currency rates and freedom from political interference
- Two points for a strong balance sheet, including manageable debt and adequate cash
- Two points for a long-term record of positive earnings and cash flow sufficient to cover dividend payments
- One point for an industry leader
Companies with 10 to 12 points have the most secure dividends, or the highest sustainability. Those with seven to nine points have above average sustainability; average sustainability, four to six points; and below average sustainability, one to three points.
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7 Artemis-linked dividend leaders
Lockheed Martin Corp. (with a 2.2% yield), headquartered in Maryland, is an industry giant that makes a range of satellites and space transportation systems. It is also the lead contractor for the Orion capsule. The company designed and built that crew module and the launch-abort system.
Virginia’s General Dynamics Corp. (1.9%) offers an array of satellite and space products. This includes components for Orion, among them S-Band Transponders and the emergency radios that kept the astronauts connected to mission command. Additionally, the company made the onboard oxygen tanks.
Northrop Grumman Corp. (1.4%), also headquartered in Virginia, is a key partner to NASA’s Artemis program. It supplies the twin solid rocket boosters that provide the majority of thrust at liftoff, as well as the abort motor for Orion.
L3Harris Technologies Inc. (1.4%), headquartered in Florida, provides technology for myriad defence and commercial applications. Through its Aerojet Rocketdyne subsidiary, it provides the four RS-25 main engines for the Space Launch System (SLS) core stage and the RL10 engine for the upper stage.
Honeywell International Inc. (2.0%), based in North Carolina, supplied a range of products for the mission, including navigation and guidance systems, data systems, and display controls.
Leiden, Netherlands-headquartered Airbus SE (1.6%) designs and makes commercial aircraft, helicopters, military transports, satellites and more. The company is the main contractor for Orion’s European Service Module (ESM). It both propels and maneuvers the Orion spacecraft and provides the crew with air and water, as well as keeping the module at a comfortable temperature.
And Massachusetts-based RTX Corp. (1.4%), through its Collins Aerospace unit, provides critical technology for the Artemis program, including the Orion capsule’s power generation, thermal control, and the Universal Waste Management System (toilet).
Scott Clayton, MBA, is senior analyst for TSI Network and associate editor of TSI Dividend Advisor.
