I’ve been away/busy/making excuses and have not put anything up in a while. So here is just a quick dividend summary for inquiring minds:

Pfizer (PFE) announced their dividend increase for 2016 to a new quarterly amount of $0.30 per share. A year ago they were paying $0.28 per share quarterly. The new dividend is payable on March 2, 2016. This represents a year over year increase of 7.1% to their dividend. Sweet. Profits look healthy enough to keep this payout ratio hovering around the 50% level, so there should be room for future increases.  PFE has been increasing their dividend going back to Q2 of 2009.

Abbott Laboratories (ABT) announced their 2016 increase to $0.26 per share quarterly per share payable on February 2, 2016. A year ago their quarterly dividend was $0.24, representing a YOY increase of 8.3%. Nice. ABT has paid 368 consecutive dividends going back to 1924, and has increased their dividend annually for 44 years. I won’t be losing any sleep anytime soon about this dividend. Looks safe on the payout to me.  What an awesome f’n company.

AbbVie Inc (ABBV) bumped their quarterly dividend to $0.57 per share. A year ago they were at $0.49 and also had a mid year 2015 bump as well. YOY the increase comes in at 16.3% (EPIC) and is payable on 2/16/16. ABBV was spun off of ABT back in 2013 and has increased their dividend every year so far. Look for that streak to continue into the future as the payout looks safe.  Here’s hoping ABBV can have a history like ABT.

Merck and Co Inc (MRK) gave a token increase of $0.01 for 2016. The new quarterly amount is $0.46 per share from $0.45. This represents a 2.2% YOY increase. I’ll take it. Merck has been increasing their dividend going back to 2011 (0.38). Look for it to increase, but unfortunately just token increases going forward.  Pretty stingy.

AT&T Inc (T) gave a token increase to $0.48 from last years $0.47. Better than nothing, I guess. Payable on 2/1/16. Look for token increases going forward. They do however have a 31 year streak of increasing dividends. A little can add up to a lot over time.

CME Group Inc (CME) announced their special variable dividend for 2016 of $2.90 per share payable 1/12/2016. MAJOR EPIC. This is a one time deal and not a gimme every year. CME does however have a history of paying pretty frequent special dividends. CME does also pay a regular quarterly dividend that they have increased every year since going public in 2003 (started at 0.028, currently $0.50). I am hoping for CME to become a future dividend aristocrat. Analyst seem to miss the mark on this company.  I just see them buying out a few more smaller derivative exchanges and their market growing as money managers and companies try to reduce volatility.

Kinder Morgan Inc (KMI) slashed their dividend for 2016. This is what I feared would happen as their payouts were getting out of control. The last purchase proved to be bad. That’s a 75% decrease heading into 2016. Fortunately, KMI is a small holding and doesn’t have an impact on the big picture for me. Still, shame on you management for not hedging yourself against commodity prices to stabilize your earnings.

For those keeping track at home, so far in 2016 I have 6 holdings that have increased their dividends and one loser with a decrease.

I hope to get a recap of 2015 dividends and investing stuff up, but I don’t know.  Tomorrow is Star Wars day for me and I’ll probably spend a large part of the day trying the jedi mind trick on people.  Cheers.

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