7 Dividend Hikes In 7 Days

With interest rates around the world dipping into negative territory and U.S. Treasury rates at all-time lows, stock dividends may be the best alternative for investors being choked by lower fixed-income yields. In the past seven days, seven companies have upped their appeal to dividend investors by officially raising their payouts:

• 7/7/16- Paychex, Inc. (NASDAQ: PAYX) raised its dividend 10 percent to $0.46.
• 7/7/16- Enterprise Products Partners L.P. (NYSE: EPD) raised its quarterly dividend 5.3 percent to $0.40.
• 7/7/16- PNC Financial Services Group Inc (NYSE: PNC) raised its quarterly dividend 8 percent to $0.55.
• 7/13/16- Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc (NASDAQ: WBA) raised its quarterly dividend 4.2 percent to $0.375.
• 7/13/16- Lakeland Financial Corporation (NASDAQ: LKFN) raised its quarterly dividend 14% to $0.28.
• 7/13/16- Home Federal Bancorp Inc of Louisiana (NASDAQ: HFBL) raised its quarterly dividend 12.5 percent to $0.09.
• 7/13/16- J M Smucker Co (NYSE: SJM) raised its quarterly dividend 12 percent to $0.75.

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In addition to the dividend hikes mentioned above, most of the big banks that submitted CCAR plans were approved for hikes.

Incredibly, the current 10-year U.S. Treasury yield is only around 1.5 percent, while the dividend yield for the S&P 500 is over 2.0 percent.

So far this year, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (NYSE: SPY) is up 6.1 percent, while the iShares Barclays 7-10 Year Trasry Bnd Fd (NYSE: IEF) is up 6.3 percent.

Disclosure: the author holds no position in the stocks mentioned.