3 Stocks with Rising Dividends

Who doesn’t love extra cash? That’s what dividends give you. Dividends are simply a company’s way of returning some of its profits to its shareholders, and if you are forward-looking and can afford to bypass the cash, you can reinvest them to help your portfolio grow significantly faster.

Dividends are incredibly important to many investors and comprise a pretty large portion of total shareholder returns. According to Morningstar and Hartford Funds, research shows that since 1940, dividends have accounted for roughly 34% of the total return of U.S. equities, according to this graph from Hartford Funds.

And there’s good news for investors as dividend increases have been ramping up lately. According to Janus Henderson, dividends paid by companies around the world hit a record $1.75 trillion last year, up 6.6% from 2023.

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There are a few reasons why a company might increase its dividend:

1. Improved cash flow (a very positive marker of a company’s performance).

2. A shift in company strategy away from focusing on investing strictly for growth and expansion.

3. If financing rates are unfavorable, a company may choose to postpone major expenditures, leaving them with excess funds.

4. A way to attract more investors.

5. To maintain and reward existing investors with occasional dividend increases. If a company doesn’t raise its dividend often enough, dividend-dependent investors may flee the stock.

6. Provide support for the stock price by increasing its dividend yield.

The following table lists the companies that have increased their dividends so far this year.

Recent Dividend Increases and Reinstatements

Source: Dividendpower.org

*Intevac was acquired by Seagate in March 2025

Dividends are so important to investors that many choose to invest in an ETF or fund that only buys Dividend Aristocrats, companies that have raised their dividends consistently for at least the past 25 years. Currently, about 69 companies meet that criteria. Here’s a link to the latest list of Dividend Aristocrats: https://www.marketbeat.com/dividends/aristocrats/.

I love to see companies handing out more money to their shareholders by way of dividend increases—especially when investors don’t have to do anything except sit back and collect their cash!

But for an investor who doesn’t already own the shares of a company that is raising its dividend, the questions becomes, “Is this a good time to buy?”

The answer is, “It depends.”

Dividends are paid from company profits. If a dividend increase is due to improved cash flows, it can be a positive sign that the company is performing well. But it may also mean that a company’s growth trajectory has slowed, and rather than using its excess profits to reinvest in more expansion, it chooses to pay a portion of them out to its shareholders. If you are a growth investor, that stock may no longer be attractive to you.

Whether or not you invest in a stock with a rising dividend is dependent upon your personal investment strategies and goals. If you are content with the reasons behind the dividend rise, and the company is fundamentally strong, then go ahead and buy it.

Meanwhile, I can’t resist analyzing companies that are increasing their dividends. I ran all of the above companies through my model to see which ones looked attractive to buy. Six looked interesting. And after further analysis, I found three stocks with rising dividends that made my “Buy” list. Here they are:

The 3 Best-Looking Stocks with Rising Dividends

As always, please make sure that these stocks meet your personal investing criteria and portfolio goals before you buy. Happy investing!

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