Dividends can produce as much as a third of your total return over long periods, and you can even retire on dividends.
There are 4 key stock dividend dates that are involved with dividend payments:
1- The Declaration Date is several weeks in advance of a dividend payment—it’s when company’s board of directors sets the amount and timing of the proposed payment.
2- The Payable Date is the date set by the board on which the dividend will actually be paid out to shareholders.
3- The Record Date is for shareholders who hold the stock before the payable date and receive the dividend payment. That date is set any number of weeks before the payable date.
4-The Ex-Dividend Date is two business days before the record date and it’s when the shares begin to trade without their dividend. If you buy stocks one day or more before their ex-dividend date, you will still get the dividend. That’s when a stock is said to trade cum-dividend. If you buy on the ex-dividend date or later, you won’t get the dividend. The ex-dividend date is in place to allow pending stock trades to settle.
We think very highly of stocks that have been paying dividends for five or more years, at TSI Network. Many of these stocks fit in well with our three-part Successful Investor philosophy:
1- Invest mainly in well-established companies;
2- Spread your money out across most if not all of the five main economic sectors (Manufacturing & Industry; Resources & Commodities; Consumer; Finance; and Utilities);
3- Downplay or avoid stocks in the broker/media limelight.
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BCE also sells wireless services to 7.8 million customers across Canada, and its Bell Media segment owns CTV Television, specialty channels and radio stations.
The company recently offered to buy the 56% of Bell Aliant (Toronto symbol BA) that it doesn’t already own. Bell Aliant sells phone and Internet services to 2.3 million clients in Atlantic Canada and rural Ontario and Quebec. It also provides wireless services through an alliance with BCE.
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The company recently completed its purchase of UNS Energy Corp., which operates power plants and distributes electricity and natural gas to 657,000 customers in Arizona.
Fortis paid $4.5 billion U.S., which includes assuming $2.0 billion U.S. of UNS’s debt. The new operations will add $1.5 billion U.S. to Fortis’s annual revenue of $4.7 billion (Canadian). The purchase also lowers Fortis’s reliance on Atlantic Canada.
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The remaining 46% of revenue and 34% of earnings come from its wireline division, which mainly consists of 3.2 million traditional phone customers in B.C., Alberta and eastern Quebec. This business also includes 1.4 million Internet users and 865,000 TV customers.
Telus’s revenue rose 18.7%, from $9.6 billion in 2009 to $11.4 billion in 2013. Revenue will probably improve to $12.0 billion in 2014.
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In the quarter ended September 27, 2014, Canadian Tire’s earnings rose 18.4%, to $172.2 million from $145.5 million a year earlier. Earnings per share gained 21.2%, to $2.17 from $1.79, on fewer shares outstanding.
Overall sales rose 3.9%, to $3.1 billion from $3.0 billion. Same-store sales at the 493 Canadian Tire outlets gained 3.2% on strong demand for summer goods, like garden tools and patio furniture, and automotive products and services.
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Thomson’s revenue rose 6.2%, from $13.0 billion in 2009 to $13.8 billion in 2011 (all amounts except share price and market cap in U.S. dollars). That’s partly due to acquisitions, particularly in developing markets like Brazil. These new businesses helped offset lower sales at its main financial division as banks and brokers cut their spending after the 2008/2009 financial crisis.
Asset sales hurt revenue growth
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In the first quarter of its 2015 fiscal year, which ended June 30, 2014, Peller’s sales rose 9.3%, to $79.5 million from $72.7 million a year earlier. That’s partly because it started selling its Wayne Gretzky wines in Western Canada. It also launched several new products, such as skinnygrape spritzers and Panama Jack cocktails.
However, strong price competition and higher sales of lessprofitable brands cut Peller’s earnings by 19.4%, to $4.1 million, or $0.30 a share, from $5.1 million, or $0.37.
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