As supply chain, labour and inflation storm clouds gathered on the horizon, City investors toasted an overflowing dividend pot and the end of this summer – boosted by the FTSE’s mining, oil and banking companies.
Total
Its
A huge third quarter –where mining dividends accounted for £1 in every £4 returned to investors – has meant
If full-year payouts reach that level it’ll be a 44.8 per cent rise on 2020.
However, only five sectors are at dividend levels higher than in 2019, illustrating the long tail of Covid’s impact.
Stokes said the recovery in payouts had been uneven across sectors.
“We have consistently seen companies deliver more in dividends than we thought likely at the beginning of the year, in the depths of the UK’s longest, strictest lockdown.
“More over, companies were progressively less impacted by each lockdown and many of them took action to bolster their balance sheets in 2020, either with new borrowing, new qeuity issuance, or cost cutting – including dividends. Dividend firepower is now much stronger as a result”.
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