Should Companies Focus More On Investing Back Into The Company Or Should They Pay Dividends First?

The dividend policy has grown over the years. This may be so that the company projects itself as a less risky share and thus also gaining investors faith. The investors buy its shares and thus increase its demand. This helps to gives positive signals to the investors signalling that the company is stable and can generate earnings steadily. This hypothesis is gains standing from the dividend hypothesis theory.

From the perspective of an investor, M&S have showed a consistent growth of earnings per share. Figures stated in the key performance measures highlight the significant growth of the EPS over the past five years. Similarly the five year record of Tesco Plc also shows an increase in EPS from 15.05p to 26.95p. Both M&S and Tesco’s, like many other competitors in

A shareholder who provides share capital to a corporation can realize a return on investment from dividends or from capital gains when shares that have increased in value are sold. The two are related because dividend payments alter the value of the shares, thereby affecting the potential capital gain (loss) on sale.

The income over the last three years has been fluctuating.. This tells us the company has an initial growth period. Sales also drop between years 7 and 8 and the gross profit margin decreased as well. This may be due to operating expenses. This leads to the prospect of stable future sales. The stakeholders are continuing to back the company and the company does predict sales will remain stable. The modest increase in sales does not show enough to recover without making adjustments to free capital.

When a company decides to pay dividends, it has to be careful on how much it will be given to the shareholders. It is of no use to pay shareholders dividends

When a company generates a profit, management has one of two choices: They can either pay it out to shareholders as a cash dividend, or retain the earnings and reinvest them in the business.

This question is designed to focus the class on the share repurchase program as a critical use of funds for 2006. The primary advantage of share repurchases using dividends is that management can turn share repurchases off and on as allowed by cash flow. The other projected uses of funds, however, are largely driven by business issues that are not as flexible for management. Students should notice that

Since the emergence of the so-called irrelevance theorem by Miller and Modigliani (1961), many corporations are puzzled about why some firms pay dividends while others do not. They were the first to study the effect of dividend policy on the market value of firms by assuming that there are no market imperfections. Miller and Modigliani (1961) proposed that divided policy chosen by a firm has no significant relationship in as far as the market valuation of the firm is concerned. They went further to explain that; the shareholders wealth remains unchanged irrespective of how the firm distributes it income because the firms’ value is rather determined by their investment policies and the earning power of its assets. They further stated that the opportunity to earn abnormal returns in the market does not exist, that is, owners are entitled to the normal market returns adjusted for risk.

In practice, dividend policy will be affected by taxes as tax rates for different categories of investors will differ. Also, a firm’s dividend policy is perceived by the financial markets to be a signaling mechanism. A cut back in dividends may signify that the firm perceives tough

Next, I invested in a popular food and beverage company, PepsiCo Inc. PepsiCo is comprised of multiple consumer segments in North America such as: Frito Lay, Quaker Foods, Aunt Jemima mixes and syrups, Aunt Jemima mixes and syrups, Quaker Chewy granola bars, Cap n Crunch and Life cereals, and Rice-A-Roni side dishes. The popular beverage segment includes beverage concentrates, fountain syrups, and finished goods such as Pepsi, Gatorade, Mountain Dew, Aquafina, etc. Since PepsiCo is worldwide, it has a handful of segments that provide consumer goods to various country and serves wholesale distributors. The company was founded in 1898 and is headquartered in Purchase, New York and expanded worldwide first entering Japan an Eastern Europe in 1966 (PepsiCo). The company was established by a merger with Pepsi-Cola and Frito-Lay and continues to add more brand names to its company today. On March 22nd, 2014 the net income applicable to common shares was 1,216,000,000 this number is a slight decrease from the 1,742,000,000 net income applicable to common shares on December 28, 2013 (Yahoo Finance). Earnings this year have been good with a positive numerical percentage of 3.76%. In the past year PepsiCo has invested five billion dollars in Mexico. This five-year investment plan Focuses on Innovation and Brand

The fact that shareholders are taxed twice through this repayment methodology infers that dividends are not their repayment technique of choice. Furthermore, paying out cash reserves through dividends also has the effect of both reducing the company’s assets and also inhibited the company’s ability to fund future growth as Dividends reduce the company’s retained earnings.

Dividends are subjected to higher tax rate compare to capital gain increased due to share buy-back. This discourages shareholders from desire to receive high dividends in place of higher capital gain as share values increase. A comparison is made below between the proposed capital structure and dividend policy.

The dividends that stockholders receive and the value of their stock shares depend on the business’s profit performance. Managers’ jobs depend on living up to the business’s profit goals.

Gittman (2004, pp. 312) divided stock into two types, such as common stock and preferred stock. He also showed that dividends are the outcome of investment. So, common stocks are an ownership claim against primarily real or productive asset (Higgins, 1995), but he also said that if the company prospers, stockholders are the chief beneficiaries, if it falters, they are the chief losers. Smith (1988) presented that stocks are one of the most popular forms of investment. People buy stocks for various reasons: some are interested in the long-term growth of their investment by buying low priced stock of a new company in the hope of substantially growth of share price over the next few years. Another reason he suggested that in a well established firm stockholders expect the stock growth will be stable over the long run. (Smith,1988).

The two restructuring program implemented resulted in net loss. However the company continued to pay dividends which exceeded earnings. In 2004, it declared dividends in spite of heavy losses. The board did not declare any dividends for the two quarters of 2005, but committed itself to resuming dividend payment as soon as possible.