38 Dividend Increases Expected In The Next 10 Weeks

In compiling the Dividend Champions list I get to see which companies are nearing the anniversaries of their previous dividend increases. Since most of these firms raise their payout about the same time every year, I can say with some confidence that they are likely to do so again.

Activity Picking Up

In recent articles in this series, I mentioned that we had passed the very slowest period of increases during the year in terms of declarations, and that the number of approaching dividend increases seemed to be picking up. Of the 45 companies listed in my August 11 article, 15 announced increases and only one plans to pay the same amount for a fifth quarter, so the majority are carried over here, joined by companies with Ex-Dividend Dates in late October and early November.

Notable increases included Year 51 by Cincinnati Financial (CINF), the 48th year of higher dividends by Nordson Corp. (NDSN), and the 5th year of increases by Broadridge Financial Solutions (BR), making it the latest Dividend Challenger.

Based on last year's announcements, I'm expecting the following companies to announce dividend increases between now and the anniversary of their previous increase:

Dividend Champions (25 or more years):

		No.	7/29			LY%	LY
Company	Symbol	Yrs	Price	Yield	Rate	Inc.	Ex-Div
Altria Group Inc.	MO	42	26.30	5.78	0.3800	8.57	9/13/10
Brady Corp.	BRC	25	29.60	2.43	0.1800	2.86	10/6/10
Clarcor Inc.	CLC	46	44.06	0.95	0.1050	7.69	10/6/10
RPM International Inc.	RPM	37	21.08	3.98	0.2100	2.44	10/14/10
Eaton Vance Corp.	EV	30	26.82	2.68	0.1800	12.50	10/27/10
Northwest Natural Gas	NWN	55	44.61	3.90	0.4350	4.82	10/27/10

Dividend Contenders (10-24 years):

		No.	7/29			LY%	LY
Company	Symbol	Yrs	Price	Yield	Rate	Inc.	Ex-Div
Vector Group Ltd.	VGR	13	17.51	9.14	0.4000	5.00	9/14/10
BancFirst Corp. OK	BANF	17	38.14	2.62	0.2500	8.70	9/28/10
Corporate Office Properties	OFC	13	31.07	5.31	0.4125	5.10	9/28/10
Getty Realty Corp.	GTY	11	23.20	8.28	0.4800	1.05	9/28/10
HCC Insurance Holdings	HCC	14	30.13	1.92	0.1450	7.41	9/29/10
Atlantic Tele Network Inc.	ATNI	13	37.77	2.33	0.2200	10.00	10/4/10
Citizens Financial Services	CZFS.OB	12	40.00	2.60	0.2600	1.96	10/13/10
West Pharmaceutical Svcs	WST	18	43.87	1.55	0.1700	6.25	10/18/10
Infosys Technologies Ltd	INFY	14	62.22	0.91	0.2827	16.56	10/19/10
Matthews International	MATW	16	36.19	0.88	0.0800	14.29	10/21/10
Brown & Brown Inc.	BRO	17	21.81	1.47	0.0800	3.23	11/1/10
1st Source Corp.	SRCE	21	23.05	2.78	0.1600	6.67	11/3/10

Dividend Challengers (5-9 years):

		No.	7/29			LY%	LY
Company	Symbol	Yrs	Price	Yield	Rate	Inc.	Ex-Div
Harris Corp.	HRS	9	39.87	2.51	0.2500	13.64	9/6/10
Shire plc	SHPGY	7	104.00	0.33	0.1730	16.50	9/8/10
G&K Services Inc.	GKSR	5	34.07	1.12	0.0950	26.67	9/14/10
Alliance Financial Corp.	ALNC	5	32.21	3.73	0.3000	7.14	9/15/10
National Semiconductor	NSM	6	24.72	1.62	0.1000	25.00	9/16/10
Nippon Tele & Tele	NTT	9	24.74	2.80	0.3459	10.72	9/27/10
NTT DoCoMo Inc.	DCM	9	18.54	3.21	0.2973	9.93	9/27/10
Sanderson Farms Inc.	SAFM	9	46.22	1.47	0.1700	13.33	10/1/10
Verizon Communications	VZ	6	35.29	5.53	0.4875	2.63	10/6/10
Accenture plc	ACN	5	59.14	1.39	0.4125	10.00	10/13/10
American Financial Group	AFG	5	33.98	1.91	0.1625	18.18	10/13/10
Cracker Barrel Old Country	CBRL	8	45.11	1.95	0.2200	10.00	10/13/10
Senior Housing Properties	SNH	7	23.94	6.18	0.3700	2.78	10/13/10
Yum! Brands Inc.	YUM	7	52.82	1.89	0.2500	19.05	10/13/10
Eagle Financial Services	EFSI	7	16.30	4.42	0.1800	5.88	10/28/10
Texas Instruments	TXN	7	29.75	1.75	0.1300	8.33	10/28/10
Bank of Marin Bancorp	BMRC	6	38.51	1.66	0.1600	6.67	11/1/10
Noble Corp.	NE	7	36.87	1.46	0.1347	2.51	11/4/10

In addition, I anticipate that two companies in the Appendix (on the Note tab) will boost their dividends during this period, marking their fifth straight year of increases and promoting them to Challenger status:

Company	Symbol	Ex-Div
Frisch's Restaurants Inc.	FRS	9/16/10
Covidien plc	COV	9/30/10

About two dozen MLPs (Master Limited Partnerships) are likely to increase their payouts, as they tend to do each quarter, again in late October or early November.

Not all of the above companies will meet the strict standards of every investor, but some may be appropriate for portfolio diversification. Potential investors should do more research before committing funds.

Source: 38 Dividend Increases Expected In The Next 10 Weeks

Disclosure: I am long MO, RPM, YUM.