Here's What We Like About Stepan Company (NYSE:SCL)'s Upcoming Dividend
Regular readers will know that we love our dividends at Simply Wall St, which is why it's exciting to see Stepan Company (NYSE:SCL) is about to trade ex-dividend in the next 4 days. You can purchase shares before the 4th of March in order to receive the dividend, which the company will pay on the 13th of March.
Stepan's upcoming dividend is US$0.28 a share, following on from the last 12 months, when the company distributed a total of US$1.10 per share to shareholders. Based on the last year's worth of payments, Stepan stock has a trailing yield of around 1.3% on the current share price of $87.12. If you buy this business for its dividend, you should have an idea of whether Stepan's dividend is reliable and sustainable. We need to see whether the dividend is covered by earnings and if it's growing.
Check out our latest analysis for Stepan
If a company pays out more in dividends than it earned, then the dividend might become unsustainable - hardly an ideal situation. Stepan is paying out just 23% of its profit after tax, which is comfortably low and leaves plenty of breathing room in the case of adverse events.
Click here to see the company's payout ratio, plus analyst estimates of its future dividends.
Have Earnings And Dividends Been Growing?
Businesses with strong growth prospects usually make the best dividend payers, because it's easier to grow dividends when earnings per share are improving. If business enters a downturn and the dividend is cut, the company could see its value fall precipitously. For this reason, we're glad to see Stepan's earnings per share have risen 12% per annum over the last five years. Earnings per share have been growing rapidly and the company is retaining a majority of its earnings within the business. Fast-growing businesses that are reinvesting heavily are enticing from a dividend perspective, especially since they can often increase the payout ratio later.
Many investors will assess a company's dividend performance by evaluating how much the dividend payments have changed over time. In the past ten years, Stepan has increased its dividend at approximately 9.6% a year on average. We're glad to see dividends rising alongside earnings over a number of years, which may be a sign the company intends to share the growth with shareholders.
The Bottom Line
Has Stepan got what it takes to maintain its dividend payments? Companies like Stepan that are growing rapidly and paying out a low fraction of earnings, are usually reinvesting heavily in their business. This is one of the most attractive investment combinations under this analysis, as it can create substantial value for investors over the long run. We think this is a pretty attractive combination, and would be interested in investigating Stepan more closely.
Ever wonder what the future holds for Stepan? See what the two analysts we track are forecasting, with this visualisation of its historical and future estimated earnings and cash flow
A common investment mistake is buying the first interesting stock you see. Here you can find a list of promising dividend stocks with a greater than 2% yield and an upcoming dividend.
If you spot an error that warrants correction, please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com. This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. Simply Wall St has no position in the stocks mentioned.
We aim to bring you long-term focused research analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Thank you for reading.
