AmerisourceBergen: Strong Dividend Hike, Share Buyback

Amerisource Bergen (NYSE: ABC), the provider of distribution services for pharmaceutical companies, said it is hiking its quarterly dividend by 33% to 8 cents a share. The new dividend is payable on December 7 to shareholders of record on November 23. The five-year dividend growth rate is over 61%, according to TheStreet.com.

In addition to the dividend increase, AmerisourceBergen is taking care of shareholders in another way. The company also announced a $500 million share repurchase program. AmerisourceBergen has just over $68 million remaining on a share buyback program that started last year and the company said it plans to spend $350 million on buybacks in 2010.