2023 Dividend Kings List | Updated Daily

Updated on March 1st, 2023 by Bob Ciura
Spreadsheet data updated daily

The Dividend Kings are the best-of-the-best in dividend longevity.

What is a Dividend King? A stock with 50 or more consecutive years of dividend increases.

The downloadable Dividend Kings Spreadsheet List below contains the following for each stock in the index among other important investing metrics:

Payout ratio
Dividend yield
Price-to-earnings ratio

You can see the full downloadable spreadsheet of all 48 Dividend Kings (along with important financial metrics such as dividend yields, payout ratios, and price-to-earnings ratios) by clicking on the link below:

Click here to instantly download your free spreadsheet of all Dividend Kings now, along with important investing metrics.

The Dividend Kings list includes recent additions such as Walmart (WMT), Nucor Corp. (NUE), Gorman-Rupp (GRC), Middlesex Water Company (MSEX), Canadian Utilities (CDUAF), and Tennant Company (TNC).

Each Dividend King satisfies the primary requirement to be a Dividend Aristocrat (25 years of consecutive dividend increases) twice over.

Not all Dividend Kings are Dividend Aristocrats.

This unexpected result is because the ‘only’ requirement to be a Dividend Kings is 50+ years of rising dividends.

On the other hand, Dividend Aristocrats must have 25+ years of rising dividends, be a member of the S&P 500 Index, and meet certain minimum size and liquidity requirements.

How To Use The Dividend Kings List To Find Dividend Stock Ideas
The 5 Best Dividend Kings Today
#5: Sysco Corp. (SYY)
#4: Johnson & Johnson (JNJ)
#3: Altria Group (MO)
#2: Lowe’s Companies (LOW)
#1: 3M Company (MMM)
Analysis Reports On All 48 Dividend Kings
Performance Of The Dividend Kings
Sector & Market Capitalization Overview
Final Thoughts

How To Use The Dividend Kings List to Find Dividend Stock Ideas

The Dividend Kings list is a great place to find dividend stock ideas. However, not all the stocks in the Dividend Kings list make a great investment at any given time.

Some stocks might be overvalued. Conversely, some might be undervalued – making great long-term holdings for dividend growth investors.

For those unfamiliar with Microsoft Excel, the following walk-through shows how to filter the Dividend Kings list for the stocks with the most attractive valuation based on the price-to-earnings ratio.

Step 1: Download the Dividend Kings Excel Spreadsheet.

Step 2: Follow the steps in the instructional video below. Note that we screen for price-to-earnings ratios of 15 or below in the video. You can choose any threshold that best defines ‘value’ for you.

Alternatively, following the instructions above and filtering for higher dividend yield Dividend Kings (yields of 2% or 3% or higher) will show stocks with 50+ years of rising dividends and above-average dividend yields.

Looking for businesses that have a long history of dividend increases isn’t a perfect way to identify stocks that will increase their dividends every year in the future, but there is considerable consistency in the Dividend Kings.

The 5 Best Dividend Kings Today

The following 5 stocks are our top-ranked Dividend Kings today, based on expected annual returns over the next 5 years. Stocks are ranked in order of lowest to highest expected annual returns.

Total returns include a combination of future earnings-per-share growth, dividends, and any changes in the P/E multiple.

Dividend King #5: Sysco Corp. (SYY)

5-Year Annual Expected Returns: 11.4%

Sysco Corporation is the largest wholesale food distributor in the United States that serves 600,000 locations with food delivery, including restaurants, hospitals, schools, hotels, and other facilities. According to estimates, the company has a ~16% market share of total food delivery within the United States.

Source: Investor Presentation

On January 31st, Sysco reported quarterly results. Non-GAAP EPS of $0.80 missed estimates by $0.04, while revenue of $18.59 billion was in-line with estimates. Sales increased 13.9% versus the same period in fiscal year 2022. U.S. Foodservice volume increased 5.2% versus the same period in fiscal year 2022 while gross profit increased 15.9% to $3.3 billion year-over-year.

Click here to download our most recent Sure Analysis report on Sysco (preview of page 1 of 3 shown below):

Dividend King #4: Johnson & Johnson (JNJ)

5-Year Annual Expected Returns: 11.7%

Johnson & Johnson is a global healthcare giant. The company currently operates three segments: Consumer, Pharmaceutical, and Medical Devices & Diagnostics. The corporation includes some 250 subsidiary companies with operations in 60 countries and products sold in over 175 countries.

The company’s most recent earnings report was delivered on January 24th, 2023 for the fourth quarter and full year. For the fourth quarter, adjusted EPS of $2.35 beat by $0.11, while revenue of $23.7 billion missed slightly.

Full-year results can be seen in the image below:

Source: Investor Presentation

For 2023, the company expects 4% adjusted operational sales growth (excluding the COVID-19 vaccine) and 3.5% adjusted earnings-per-share growth.

Johnson & Johnson’s key competitive advantage is the size and scale of its business. The company is a worldwide leader in several healthcare categories. Johnson & Johnson’s diversification allows it to continue to grow even if one of the segments is underperforming.

The company has increased its dividend for 60 consecutive years, making it a Dividend King. The stock is owned by many well-known money managers. For example, J&J is a Kevin O’Leary dividend stock.

Click here to download our most recent Sure Analysis report on JNJ (preview of page 1 of 3 shown below):

Dividend King #3: Altria Group (MO)

5-Year Annual Expected Returns: 11.7%

Altria Group was founded by Philip Morris in 1847. Today, it is a consumer staples giant. It sells the Marlboro cigarette brand in the U.S. and a number of other non-smokeable brands, including Skoal, Copenhagen, and more. Altria also has a 10% ownership stake in global beer giant Anheuser Busch InBev, in addition to large stakes in Juul, a vaping products manufacturer and distributor, as well as cannabis company Cronos Group (CRON).

On February 1st, 2023, Altria reported third-quarter results. Its Q4 Non-GAAP EPS of $1.18 beat analyst estimates by $0.02 while its revenue of $5.08B (-0.2% Y/Y) missed analyst estimates by $70M. Management’s plans for 2023 include a continuation of their strategy to balance earnings growth and shareholder returns with strategic investments.

The company expects to deliver 2023 full-year adjusted diluted EPS in a range of $4.98 to $5.13, representing a growth rate of 3% to 6% from a base of $4.84 in 2022. It expects its full-year adjusted effective tax rate will be in a range of 24.5% to 25.5% and capital expenditures to be between $175M and $225M. The company authorized a new $1 billion share repurchase program, which it expects to complete by December 31, 2023.

Click here to download our most recent Sure Analysis report on Altria (preview of page 1 of 3 shown below):

Dividend King #2: Lowe’s Companies (LOW)

5-Year Annual Expected Returns: 13.3%

Lowe’s Companies is the second-largest home improvement retailer in the US (after Home Depot). Lowe’s operates or services more than 2,200 home improvement and hardware stores in the U.S. and Canada.

Lowe’s reported third quarter 2022 results on November 16th. Total sales for the third quarter came in at $23.5 billion compared to $22.9 billion in the same quarter a year ago. Comparable sales increased 2.2%, while the U.S. home improvement comparable sales increased 3.0%. Of note, pro customer sales rose 19% year-over-year.

The company took a $2.1 billion pre-tax non-cash asset impairment charge related to its Canadian retail business. The sale of the Canadian retail business is expected to close in early 2023. Adjusted net earnings, which excludes this significant impairment charge, rose 19.8% year-over-year to $3.27 per share.

The combination of multiple expansion, 6% expected EPS growth and the 2.1% dividend yield lead to total expected returns of 14.1% per year.

Click here to download our most recent Sure Analysis report on Lowe’s (preview of page 1 of 3 shown below):

Dividend King #1: 3M Company (MMM)

5-Year Annual Expected Returns: 15.5%

3M sells more than 60,000 products that are used every day in homes, hospitals, office buildings and schools around the world. It has about 95,000 employees and serves customers in more than 200 countries.

3M is now composed of four separate divisions. The Safety & Industrial division produces tapes, abrasives, adhesives, and supply chain management software as well as manufactures personal protective gear and security products.

The Healthcare segment supplies medical and surgical products as well as drug delivery systems. The Transportation & Electronics division produces fibers and circuits with a goal of using renewable energy sources while reducing costs. The Consumer division sells office supplies, home improvement products, protective materials, and stationary supplies.

Source: Investor Presentation

The company also announced that it would be spinning off its Health Care segment, which would have had $8.6 billion of revenue in 2021. The transaction is expected to close by the end of 2023.

We expect 15.5% annual returns for 3M stock, driven by 5% expected EPS growth, the 5.5% dividend yield, and a significant boost from an expanding P/E multiple.

Click here to download our most recent Sure Analysis report on 3M (preview of page 1 of 3 shown below):

Analysis Reports On All 48 Dividend Kings

All 48 Dividend Kings are listed below by sector. You can access detailed coverage of each by clicking on the name of each Dividend King.

Additionally, you can download our newest Sure Analysis Research Database report for each Dividend King as well.

Basic Materials

Stepan (SCL) – [See newest Sure Analysis report]
H.B. Fuller (FUL) – [See newest Sure Analysis report]
PPG Industries (PPG) – [See newest Sure Analysis report]
Nucor Corp. (NUE) – [See newest Sure Analysis report]

Consumer Discretionary

Consumer Staples

Energy

National Fuel Gas (NFG) – [See newest Sure Analysis report]

Financial Services

Healthcare

Industrial

Real Estate

Federal Realty Investment Trust (FRT) – [See newest Sure Analysis report]

Utilities

Performance Of The Dividend Kings

The Dividend Kings out-performed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) in February 2023. Return data for the month is shown below:

Dividend Kings February 2023 total return: -0.5%
SPY February 2023 total return: -2.3%

Stable dividend growers like the Dividend Kings tend to underperform in bull markets and outperform on a relative basis during bear markets.

The Dividend Kings are not officially regulated and monitored by any one company. There’s no Dividend King ETF. This means that tracking the historical performance of the Dividend Kings can be difficult. More specifically, performance tracking of the Dividend Kings often introduces significant survivorship bias.

Survivorship bias occurs when one looks at only the companies that ‘survived’ the time period in question. In the case of Dividend Kings, this means that the performance study does not include ex-Kings that reduced their dividend, were acquired, etc.

But with that said, there is something to be gained from investigating the historical performance of the Dividend Kings. Specifically, the performance of the Dividend Kings shows that ‘boring’ established blue-chip stocks that increase their dividend year-after-year can significantly outperform over long periods of time.

Notes: S&P 500 performance is measured using the S&P 500 ETF (SPY). The Dividend Kings performance is calculated using an equal weighted portfolio of today’s Dividend Kings, rebalanced annually. Due to insufficient data, Farmers & Merchants Bancorp (FMCB) returns are from 2000 onward. Performance excludes previous Dividend Kings that ended their streak of dividend increases which creates notable lookback/survivorship bias. The data for this study is from Ycharts.

In the next section of this article, we will provide an overview of the sector and market capitalization characteristics of the Dividend Kings.

Sector & Market Capitalization Overview

The sector and market capitalization characteristics of the Dividend Kings are very different from the characteristics of the broader stock market.

The following bullet points show the number of Dividend Kings in each sector of the stock market.

Consumer Staples: 13
Industrials: 12
Utilities: 7
Consumer Discretionary: 3
Health Care: 4
Financials: 4
Materials: 4
Real Estate: 1
Energy: 1

The Dividend Kings are overweight in the Industrials, Consumer Staples, and Utilities sectors. Interestingly, The Dividend Kings have just one stock from the Information Technology sector, which is the largest component of the S&P 500 index.

The Dividend Kings also have some interesting characteristics with respect to market capitalization. These trends are illustrated below.

5 Mega caps ($200 billion+ market cap; ABBV, JNJ, PEP, PG, KO, WMT)
21 Large caps ($10 billion to $200 billion market cap)
14 Mid caps ($2 billion to $10 billion)
8 Small caps ($300 million to $2 billion)

Interestingly, 22 out of the 48 Dividend Kings have market capitalizations below $10 billion. This shows that corporate longevity doesn’t have to be accompanied by massive size.

Final Thoughts

Screening to find the best Dividend Kings is not the only way to find high-quality dividend growth stock ideas.

Sure Dividend maintains similar databases on the following useful universes of stocks:

The High Yield Dividend Kings List is comprised of the 20 Dividend Kings with the highest current yields.
The Dividend Aristocrats: S&P 500 stocks with 25+ years of consecutive dividend increases.
The High Yield Dividend Aristocrats List is comprised of the 20 Dividend Aristocrats with the highest current yields.
The Dividend Champions: stocks with 25+ years of dividend increases, including stocks which may not otherwise qualify as Dividend Aristocrats.
The Dividend Contenders: 10-24 consecutive years of dividend increases.
The Dividend Challengers: 5-9 consecutive years of dividend increases.
The Dividend Achievers: dividend stocks with 10+ years of consecutive dividend increases.
The Complete List of High Dividend Stocks: Stocks with 5%+ dividend yields.
The Complete List of Monthly Dividend Stocks: our database currently contains more than 30 stocks that pay dividends every month.
The Blue-Chip Stocks List: our list of “blue-chip stocks” is a combination of our Dividend Kings, Dividend Aristocrats, and Dividend Achievers lists.

There is nothing magical about investing in the Dividend Kings. They are simply a group of high-quality businesses with shareholder-friendly management teams that have strong competitive advantages.

Purchasing businesses with these characteristics at fair or better prices and holding them for long periods of time will likely result in strong long-term investment performance.

The most appealing part of investing is that you have unlimited choice. You can buy into mediocre businesses, or just the excellent companies.

As Warren Buffett says:

“When we own portions of outstanding businesses with outstanding managements, our favorite holding period is forever.”

– Warren Buffett

Click here to instantly download your free spreadsheet of all Dividend Kings now, along with important investing metrics.

Thanks for reading this article. Please send any feedback, corrections, or questions to support@suredividend.com.

Sure Dividend

High-Quality Dividend Stocks, Long-Term Plan

2023 Dividend Kings List | Updated Daily | All 48 Analyzed

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