Deep Dive: Equity income strategies can reduce exposure to volatility

Avoid dividend champion trap

Alain Zeitouni, head of multi-asset at Russell Investments, dives into global equity income.

Despite the MSCI World total return (including dividends) outperforming the MSCI World Price (excluding dividends) by close to 22% over the past five years - representing an annualised 2.6% extra performance over the period - dividend investing has fallen out of favour. Investors have instead focused on growth stories with technology stocks driving most of the equity market performance. Indeed, while the S&P Dividend Aristocrat returned 107.5% over the past five years, it trailed the S&P 500 index which was up 133.3% during this period. The stark difference in performance between both MS...