Financials Bolster Nikkei; Stocks Going Ex-Dividend

Japanese bank stocks are grabbing more headlines these days as they continue to scavenge around wounded U.S. i-banks. Nomura (8604) (NMR) added some more Lehman (LEH) human capital (in Europe/ME after snagging its Asian ops) and Sumitomo Mitsui FG (8316) (SMFJY.PK) is said to be considering making an investment in Goldman (GS). Investors responded particularly favorably to Nomura’s efforts to become global-class, pushing the stock up 15% to ¥1,505 over the last two sessions. No doubt this is a great opportunity, but the challenge will be achieving synergies and profit accretion (Update: see FT commentary in How to say ‘no’ – er, ‘yes’ - in Japanese and Nomura creates $1bn pool for Lehman staff). The Nikkei managed a 0.2% gain after being down nearly 2% intraday. TOPIX ended fractionally lower.

In light of Japanese stocks going ex-dividend (interim) tomorrow, below is a ranking of Japanese stocks with ADRs based on ordinary share dividend yield (above 2.5%).* The Japanese benchmark 10-year JGB was last at 1.49%.

Nissan (7201) (NSANY) — 4.98%
Makita (6586) (MKTAY) — 4.05%
NTT DoCoMo (9437) (DCM) — 2.93%
Toyota (7203) (TM) — 2.91%
Mitsui (8031) (MITSY) — 2.85%
Canon (7751) (CAJ) — 2.61%
Honda (7267) (HMC) — 2.51%

*Dividend yields applicable to ordinary shares and based on Sept. 24, 2008 market close in Japan. Source: Yahoo! Finance Japan.

Disclosure: No position in any stocks mentioned.

Comments

[Dividend Gr...:]

How certain are you on the stability of dividend payments from this list? I am not a big fan of auto stocks which are pretty cyclical in nature - TM , NSANY and HMC.

2008 Sep 24 11:51 AM