Zooming in on LON:GRI’s 1.7% Dividend Yield

Dividends play an important role in compounding returns in the long run and end up forming a sizeable part of investment returns. Historically, Grainger plc (LON:GRI) has paid a dividend to shareholders. It currently yields 1.7%. Does Grainger tick all the boxes of a great dividend stock? Below, I’ll take you through my analysis.

See our latest analysis for Grainger

5 questions I ask before picking a dividend stock

If you are a dividend investor, you should always assess these five key metrics:

• Does it pay an annual yield higher than 75% of dividend payers?

• Has it paid dividend every year without dramatically reducing payout in the past?

• Has dividend per share amount increased over the past?

• Is is able to pay the current rate of dividends from its earnings?

• Will the company be able to keep paying dividend based on the future earnings growth?

LSE:GRI Historical Dividend Yield October 18th 18

How does Grainger fare?

The company currently pays out 25% of its earnings as a dividend, according to its trailing twelve-month data, which means that the dividend is covered by earnings. In the near future, analysts are predicting a higher payout ratio of 45%, leading to a dividend yield of 2.7%. In addition to this, EPS should increase to £0.20. The higher payout forecasted, along with higher earnings, should lead to greater dividend income for investors moving forward.

When assessing the forecast sustainability of a dividend it is also worth considering the cash flow of the business. A company with strong cash flow, relative to earnings, can sometimes sustain a high pay out ratio.

If there is one thing that you want to be reliable in your life, it’s dividend stocks and their constant income stream. Not only have dividend payouts from Grainger fallen over the past 10 years, it has also been highly volatile during this time, with drops of over 25% in some years. These characteristics do not bode well for income investors seeking reliable stream of dividends.

Compared to its peers, Grainger has a yield of 1.7%, which is on the low-side for Real Estate stocks.

Next Steps:

Now you know to keep in mind the reason why investors should be careful investing in Grainger for the dividend. But if you are not exclusively a dividend investor, the stock could still be an interesting investment opportunity. Given that this is purely a dividend analysis, I urge potential investors to try and get a good understanding of the underlying business and its fundamentals before deciding on an investment. I’ve put together three relevant aspects you should further research:

1. Future Outlook: What are well-informed industry analysts predicting for GRI’s future growth? Take a look at our free research report of analyst consensus for GRI’s outlook.

2. Valuation: What is GRI worth today? Even if the stock is a cash cow, it’s not worth an infinite price. The intrinsic value infographic in our free research report helps visualize whether GRI is currently mispriced by the market.

3. Dividend Rockstars: Are there better dividend payers with stronger fundamentals out there? Check out our free list of these great stocks here.

To help readers see past the short term volatility of the financial market, we aim to bring you a long-term focused research analysis purely driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis does not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements.

The author is an independent contributor and at the time of publication had no position in the stocks mentioned. For errors that warrant correction please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com.