88V8 wrote:idpickering wrote:monabri wrote:I see that the yield on BATS ... is currently 5.97% ... Which one is the one most likely to maintain and/or grow the dividend
To be honest monabri, I have no concerns regarding either of them doing just that.
LSE, the source to which I habitually and perhaps erroneously go for thumbnails has a yield of 5.3% this morning http://www.lse.co.uk/SharePrice.asp?SharePrice=bats.
I suspect that's the result of the change of payment frequency and a rather unusual bit of dividend declaration by BATS. In their 2017 final results in February, they said:
"On 26 April 2017, the Group announced its move to quarterly dividends with effect from 1 January 2018. Further to that announcement, the Board has declared an interim dividend of 195.2p per ordinary share of 25p, payable in four equal quarterly instalments of 48.8p per ordinary share in May 2018, August 2018, November 2018 and February 2019. This represents an increase of 15.2% on 2016 (2016: 169.4p per share), and a payout ratio, on 2017 adjusted diluted earnings per share, of 69%."
I.e. they actually declared four interim dividend payments for 2018 for about 3, 6, 9 and 12 months after the announcement, rather than just announcing an intention to pay them. I don't think there's a legal difference - IIRC interim dividends can be changed by the directors at any time prior to them becoming actual liabilities owed to the shareholders on their payment date - but a dividend declaration does create a much stronger expectation that the dividend will be paid than a mere statement of intent.
The dividenddata dividend history page makes it plain that they have accepted 195.2p as the total dividend for 2018, and their yield page's figure of 5.97% is the (correctly rounded to 2 decimal places) result of dividing that by the over-the-weekend closing price of 3272p. According to your link, the LSE's yield figure is based on a dividend of 174.6p, and a bit of experimenting says that that's probably the (similarly rounded) result of dividing that dividend figure by the current price. The 174.6p figure appears to be the 2016 final of 118.1p plus the 2017 interim of 56.5p - I haven't quite worked out why the LSE is using that figure, but my best guess is that it's because the most recent rolling total that isn't distorted by the switch from half-yearly to quarterly payments.
Anyway, it looks as though dividenddata is using a dividend figure that anticipates more future payments than usual and the LSE a total dividend figure that is more out of date than either a historical or a rolling historical figure would normally be. Both appear to have been set off by the half yearly -> quarterly payment frequency change, but they've gone off in opposite directions to do so - hence the fairly substantial difference...
Gengulphus
