In downturn markets, it’s best to gather revenue and wait it out.
There are times when the best thing to do in a bear market is to get paid to wait until things get better.
This year, dividend investing has done better than the 17.3% drop in the S&P 500 in terms of total return, which includes dividends that have been re-invested through Friday. As of Friday, the iShares Select Dividend ETF had lost less than 2% of its value over the past year, while the Vanguard High Dividend Yield Index ETF had lost a little more than 6%.
In their weekly Global Portfolio Manager’s Digest, analysts at Barclays looked for individual stocks that pay good dividends, especially dividends that have grown in the past or are expected to grow in the future. Safety is a must. It doesn’t make sense to cut the dividend if the stock price is also falling off a cliff.
First, Barclays only chose stocks that it thinks are good enough to buy. The bank then looked for companies whose average dividend yield over the past three years was more than 3% and whose dividend yield is expected to grow or at least stay the same through 2023, based on estimates from Barclays.
The two stocks with the highest yields were both in the energy sector. This year and next, NuStar Energy is expected to earn 12%, while Viper Energy Partners is expected to earn 11.4%.
Ten of the 27 stocks that made Barclays’ list had dividends that were above average. These were all real estate stocks. By the end of next year, SL Green Realty is expected to pay 7.9 percent, while Medical Properties Trust is expected to pay 7.9 percent in 2022 and 8.1 percent in 2023.
The bank was interested in consumer discretionary stocks, and Restaurant Brands International stood out because its yield in 2022 was 4.5 percent and would grow to 4.8 percent in 2023. Burger King and Tim Hortons are both owned by this company.
In other sectors, the highest-yielding stocks were Energizer Holdings (4.5%) in consumer staples, Fidelity National Financial (4.9%) in financials, and Cisco Systems (3.4%) in tech in 2022, rising to 3.6%) in tech in 2023.
Barclays also pointed out Ardagh Metal Packaging (6.6 percent in 2022 and 6.8 percent in 2023) and Sempra Energy (3.4% this year and 3.7% in 2023) in the materials and utilities sectors, respectively.