Topic: How To Invest

Dividend Advisor Hotline – Friday, October 27, 2017

Article Excerpt

FORTIS INC., $47.13, Toronto symbol FTS, owns electrical utilities across Canada, the U.S. and the Caribbean. It also distributes natural gas in British Columbia. The company will raise its quarterly dividend with the December 2017 payment by 6.25%, to $0.425 a share from $0.40. The new annual rate of $1.70 yields 3.6%. Fortis also announced that it will invest $14.5 billion in its operations between 2018 and 2022. That’s up $1.5 billion from its earlier plan. To put those amounts in context, the company’s market cap (the total value of all outstanding shares) is $19.8 billion. Those improvements include making its transmission lines more reliable, expanding the capacity of its gas distribution systems and replacing aging wooden poles. The company mainly operates regulated utilities, so regulators will let it pass along most of the costs of upgrading to its customers. Fortis has now increased its dividend each year for the past 44 years. The company plans to raise that annual payment by about 6%…