How to profit from new global dividend culture

Bruce Stout, manager of Murray International Trust, examines how companies in Europe, Asia and Latin America are changing their attitudes towards equity income investors.

Dividends have always provided investors with a steady stream of income. But in recent years, with interest rates at rock bottom in developed economies, investors have appreciated the benefits of higher dividend yields. This is not only because of the equity income they offer, but because being able to pay a steady dividend has been an important signal of corporate health and confidence in difficult markets. Investors used to focus on the UK’s long established “dividend culture”, where dividends were less likely to be cut than in other countries when the going got hard. But the concent...