Yahoo Finance There's A Lot To Like About Kunlun Energy Company Limited's (HKG:135) Upcoming CN¥0.26 Dividend
Readers hoping to buy Kunlun Energy Company Limited (HKG:135) for its dividend will need to make their move shortly, as the stock is about to trade ex-dividend. If you purchase the stock on or after the 2nd of June, you won't be eligible to receive this dividend, when it is paid on the 31st of July.
Kunlun Energy's next dividend payment will be HK$0.26 per share. Last year, in total, the company distributed HK$0.26 to shareholders. Looking at the last 12 months of distributions, Kunlun Energy has a trailing yield of approximately 6.0% on its current stock price of HK$4.72. We love seeing companies pay a dividend, but it's also important to be sure that laying the golden eggs isn't going to kill our golden goose! So we need to investigate whether Kunlun Energy can afford its dividend, and if the dividend could grow.
View our latest analysis for Kunlun Energy
If a company pays out more in dividends than it earned, then the dividend might become unsustainable - hardly an ideal situation. That's why it's good to see Kunlun Energy paying out a modest 39% of its earnings. Yet cash flow is typically more important than profit for assessing dividend sustainability, so we should always check if the company generated enough cash to afford its dividend. Fortunately, it paid out only 30% of its free cash flow in the past year.
It's encouraging to see that the dividend is covered by both profit and cash flow. This generally suggests the dividend is sustainable, as long as earnings don't drop precipitously.
Click here to see the company's payout ratio, plus analyst estimates of its future dividends.
Have Earnings And Dividends Been Growing?
Businesses with strong growth prospects usually make the best dividend payers, because it's easier to grow dividends when earnings per share are improving. If business enters a downturn and the dividend is cut, the company could see its value fall precipitously. With that in mind, we're encouraged by the steady growth at Kunlun Energy, with earnings per share up 3.7% on average over the last five years. Recent earnings growth has been limited. Yet there are several ways to grow the dividend, and one of them is simply that the company may choose to pay out more of its earnings as dividends.
The main way most investors will assess a company's dividend prospects is by checking the historical rate of dividend growth. Kunlun Energy has delivered an average of 16% per year annual increase in its dividend, based on the past ten years of dividend payments. It's encouraging to see the company lifting dividends while earnings are growing, suggesting at least some corporate interest in rewarding shareholders.
To Sum It Up
Is Kunlun Energy worth buying for its dividend? Earnings per share growth has been growing somewhat, and Kunlun Energy is paying out less than half its earnings and cash flow as dividends. This is interesting for a few reasons, as it suggests management may be reinvesting heavily in the business, but it also provides room to increase the dividend in time. It might be nice to see earnings growing faster, but Kunlun Energy is being conservative with its dividend payouts and could still perform reasonably over the long run. It's a promising combination that should mark this company worthy of closer attention.
On that note, you'll want to research what risks Kunlun Energy is facing. To help with this, we've discovered 4 warning signs for Kunlun Energy that you should be aware of before investing in their shares.
A common investment mistake is buying the first interesting stock you see. Here you can find a list of promising dividend stocks with a greater than 2% yield and an upcoming dividend.
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This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned. Thank you for reading.
