Compare recurring dividend payers across the companies StockTools tracks, ranked by trailing dividend yield using SEC-filed dividend data.
How this ranking is built
Eligibility is decided first, and the rank is trailing yield alone. A company qualifies when it has four or more filed quarterly dividends inside the last 400 days, at least eight quarters of history, filed data no more than 400 days old, and a price to compute a yield against. Quality tests gate entry; they are never blended into the score, because a blended number cannot be explained in a sentence.
Every figure comes from each company’s own SEC filings: per-share dividends declared per fiscal quarter. Where a company never tags its fourth quarter as a standalone period, and many calendar-year filers never do, that quarter is reconstructed as the filed full-year figure minus the filed nine-month figure. That reconstruction runs only when the three filed quarters agree with the nine-month total, so a filer whose own numbers disagree is skipped rather than guessed at.
A trailing yield is not a forward rate. Where one quarter carried at least twice the next largest, the row says what share of the trailing total it was. Nothing in the filings marks a payment as special, so the page reports the composition rather than asserting intent, and such a company keeps the rank its arithmetic earns. Educational information, not investment advice.
Dividend Leaders FAQ
Which companies are ranked here?
Only the filers StockTools covers, and only those that pass the eligibility gate: four or more filed quarterly dividends inside the last 400 days, at least eight quarters of history, a computable yield, and filed data no more than 400 days old. Coverage is curated and is not the whole US market.
Why trailing twelve months rather than this calendar year?
Dividend quarters are keyed by fiscal period end, and fiscal years differ across companies. A calendar-year bucket published mid-year would be incomplete for everyone and differently incomplete depending on each company’s fiscal calendar, which would rank fiscal calendars rather than dividends.
What does the uneven-year warning mean?
It appears when one quarter contributed at least twice as much as the next largest, which makes a trailing yield unrepresentative of the current rate. Nothing in the filings labels a payment as special, so the page states the composition and lets you draw the conclusion rather than asserting intent.
Where do the dividend figures come from?
Per-share dividends declared per fiscal quarter, from each company’s own SEC filings. Where a company never tags its fourth quarter as a standalone period, that quarter is reconstructed as the filed full-year figure minus the filed nine-month figure, and only when the three filed quarters agree with the nine-month total.