P&G Joins DJIA Dividend Hike Brigade (PG, KO, MMM, INTC, GE, JPM, CSCO)

2010 may be the year of many things, but it is so far becoming the year of dividend hikes.  The Procter & Gamble Company (NYSE: PG) has just joined the dividend hike brigade with its announcement last night.  The consumer products giant is raising its quarterly dividend from $0.44 to $0.4818 per common share, which is in-line with its hike in 2009 when it went from $0.40 to $0.44 per quarter.  This is not at all the first dividend hike from a Dow Jones Industrial Average component.  The Coca-Cola Company (NYSE: KO) recently hiked its dividend and 3M Co. (NYSE: MMM) and United Technologies Corp. (NYSE: UTX) raised its dividend in February.  The Q1 dividend for Intel Corp. (NASDAQ: INTC) was also higher in payment, but that was announced in November of 2009.

Last week was a disappointment that General Electric Co. (NYSE: GE) and J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM) only kept their same stance that dividend hikes were coming, just not yet and not on an official time.  GE is still sticking with 2011 and Jamie Dimon is still sticking with “we already can raise the dividend but we think regulators won’t let us” stance.

Some may say today’s rate of the dividend hike from P&G is smaller at 9.5% versus a prior hike of 10% last year and versus a hike of 14%.  What else is there to demand in the new normal?

A quarterly hike of 4.18 cents per quarter is just under $0.17 per year, and P&G shares are up $0.44 in the pre-market session at $63.66 after closing up 0.6% at $63.22 on Monday.

The new dividend rate for P&G comes to 3.05% for its dividend yield, which puts this at either #9 or #10 of the 30 DJIA components ranked by the highest dividend.  Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO) is the last of the DJIA components to still not have a dividend, something we still continue expect to hear about from John Chambers in the near future.

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JON C. OGG