Does Agrium pass our checks?
The current payout ratio for the stock is 87.50%, meaning the dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. However, going forward, analysts expect AGU’s payout to fall to 47.81% of its earnings, which leads to a dividend yield of around 3.15%. However, EPS should increase to $5.67, meaning that the lower payout ratio does not necessarily implicate a lower dividend payment. If dividend is a key criteria in your investment consideration, then you need to make sure the dividend stock you’re eyeing out is reliable in its payments. AGU has increased its DPS from $0.11 to $3.5 in the past 10 years. During this period it has not missed a payment, as one would expect for a company increasing its dividend. This is an impressive feat, which makes AGU a true dividend rockstar. Compared to its peers, Agrium has a yield of 2.44%, which is high for chemicals stocks but still below the market’s top dividend payers.
What this means for you:
Are you a shareholder? Investors of Agrium can continue to expect strong dividends from the stock moving forward. With its favorable dividend characteristics, Agrium is one worth keeping around in your income portfolio. However, depending on your current portfolio, it may be valuable exploring other dividend stocks to increase diversification, or even look at high-growth stocks to complement your steady income stocks. I suggest continuing your research by checking out my interactive free list of dividend rockstars as well as high-growth stocks to potentially add to your holdings.
Are you a potential investor? Taking into account the dividend metrics, Agrium ticks most of the boxes as a strong dividend investment, putting it in my list of top dividend payers. I also recommend taking sufficient time to understand its core business and determine whether the company and its investment properties suit your overall goals. Whether or not you like the stock as a dividend play, it’s still worth checking the price tag. Is Agrium still a bargain? Check our latest free analysis to find out!
To help readers see pass 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.