August 2025 saw a net-negative result for the number of dividend changes announced during the month. Overall, the net change in the year-over-year total of unfavorable dividend changes exceeded the number of favorable changes by 14, pulling this simple measure of the relative health of the U.S. stock market into negative territory.

August 2025 is the seventh consecutive month in which that has happened.

This negative trend is largely driven by a falling number of firms announcing favorable dividend changes. The number of firms announcing favorable dividend changes like dividend increases, resumptions, and extra (or special) dividend payouts to their shareholders is declining with respect to the same months a year earlier.

At the same time, the number of firms announcing outright negative dividend actions, like dividend decreases or omitting (or suspending) their dividends remains well below levels associated with recessionary conditions being present in the U.S. economy.

This combination indicates firms are facing headwinds in growing their earnings, which is to say their profits aren't increasing as fast as they were a year ago. The following table presents our summary of August 2025's favorable and unfavorable dividend actions, which shows how much they changed both since August 2024 (year-over-year) and since August 2025 (month-over-month).

The following chart presents just the monthly counts of dividend increases and decreases from January 2004 through August 2025. Be sure to note the falling number of firms announcing dividend rises since early 2023.

Curiously, this is the third consecutive month in which the number of announced dividend decreases has totaled 13. This is the first time we've scored a three-peat in the modern dividend action data for decreases, which extends back to January 2004.

References

Standard and Poor. S&P Market Attributes Web File. [Excel Spreadsheet]. Accessed 1 September 2025.

Image Credit: Microsoft Copilot Designer. Prompt: "An editorial cartoon of a Wall Street bull straining to climb up a hill because a Wall Street bear is operating a wind machine labeled 'EARNINGS HEADWINDS' to slow them down".

The outlook for the S&P 500's dividends in the current and remaining quarters of 2025 improved in the month since we presented our previous snapshot of their future.

The amount of dividends expected to be paid out the remaining quarters of 2025 have risen above the levels recorded on 14 July 2025, with both quarters seeing gains and 2025-Q3 seeing a very large one. Here are the projections recorded as of the close of trading on Monday, 13 August 2025.

• 2025-Q3: Increase of $0.55, rising to $19.81 per share
• 2025-Q4: Increase of $0.09, rising to $19.85 per share

The following animated chart shows how expectations for the S&P 500's quarterly dividends per share changed in the month from 14 July 2025 to 13 August 2025. If you're reading this article on a site that republishes our RSS news feed, you may need to click through to our site to see the animation.

As a special bonus, here's a first outlook for the S&P 500's dividends expected in the first quarter of 2026:

• 2026-Q1: $20.64 per share

If that expectation holds, it will represent a year-over-year increase of $0.31 per share over 2025-Q1's finalized $20.33 per share.

More About Dividend Futures Data

How changes in the outlook for dividends at specific points of time in the future contribute to changes in stock prices is described by this math.

For this series, we have been taking a snapshot of the CME Group's S&P 500 quarterly dividend futures data shortly after the second or third week of each month.

Dividend futures indicate the amount of dividends per share to be paid out over the period covered by each quarter's dividend futures contracts, which start on the day after the preceding quarter's dividend futures contracts expire and end on the third Friday of the month ending the indicated quarter. So for example, as determined by dividend futures contracts, the now "current" quarter of 2025-Q3 began on Saturday, 21 June 2025 and will end on Friday, 19 September 2025. From the perspective of dividend futures, 2025-Q4 will become the current quarter on Saturday, 22 September 2025.

Because dividend futures are tied to options contracts that run on this schedule, that makes these figures different from the quarterly dividends per share figures that are reported by Standard and Poor. S&P reports the amount of dividends per share paid out during regular calendar quarters after the end of each quarter. This term mismatch accounts for the differences in dividends reported by both sources, with the biggest differences between the two typically seen in the first and fourth quarters of each year.

Image Credit: Microsoft Copilot Designer. Prompt: "A crystal ball with the word 'SP 500' written inside it". And 'Dividends' written above it, which we added.

July 2025 has come and gone. For the dividend paying stocks of the U.S. stock market, the month was once again net-negative when measured year-over-year. There were fewer favorable changes, such as dividend increases, special (or extra) dividend payouts to shareholders during the month. There were also more unfavorable changes in the form of dividend decreases during the month.

Adding up all the favorable and unfavorable year-over-year changes in dividends, we find the single number that summarizes the month is -15.

July 2025 represents the sixth consecutive month in which that outcome has occurred. The falling number of dividend increases is the continuation of a general trend that's been underway since 2023, coinciding with the period in which the inflation unleashed by the Biden administration caught up with the First In, First Out (FIFO) accounting rules most U.S. businesses use to determine their level of profitability. In 2021-2022, when that inflation was inflicted on Americans, firms reported higher profits because FIFO accounting rules require them to "consume" their oldest acquired inventories first when determining their earnings, regardless of their cost of replacing it. Only after fully drawing down their accounting supply of lower cost inventory could they report the cost of the higher cost inventory that replaced it in calculating their earnings.

From 2023 into 2025, the inflated cost of inventory has effectively shrank the reported profits of many of these firms. Consequently, fewer firms have the profitability needed to back paying higher dividends to their shareholding owners, which is why the number of dividend increases has been on the decline throughout this period.

July 2025's favorable and unfavorable dividend actions are tallied in the following table, which shows how much they changed both since July 2024 (year-over-year) and since June 2025 (month-over-month).

The following chart visualizes the monthly counts of dividend increases and decreases from January 2004 through July 2025. Be sure to note the falling number of firms announcing dividend rises since early 2023.

The number of firms announcing decreased dividend payouts remains below the threshold that clearly signals recessionary conditions are afoot in the U.S. economy. The declining number of favorable dividend announcements indicates firms are indeed experiencing negative headwinds that they expect will continue for some time longer.

References

Standard and Poor. S&P Market Attributes Web File. [Excel Spreadsheet]. Accessed 5 August 2025.

Image Credit: Microsoft Copilot Designer. Prompt: "An editorial cartoon of a bear wearing a suit who is blocking salmon that say 'DIVIDENDS' from getting to the Wall Street bulls who are fishing for them".

When financial analysts talk about the biggest or most valuable publicly-traded companies in the world, they mean the companies that have the largest market capitalization. Called market cap for short, this is the number you get when you take the price of a company's stock and multiply it by the number of shares of stock it has issued. It represents the total valuation of the company.

When stocks are grouped together into an index, like the S&P 500 (Index: SPX), they are often weighted within the index according to their market cap. For example, the biggest company in the world in July 2025 is Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) has a market cap of over $4 trillion by itself. When combined with the 502 other companies that make up the S&P 500 index, it alone accounts for about 7% of the entire value of the index. As a result, even relatively moderate changes in the price of NVDA's stock will have a significant influence over how the value of the index changes from day-to-day.

We were curious to see if there's a relationship between a company's market cap and its dividend yield. It can be argued there should be because whenever dividends are paid, it directly shrinks a company's market capitalization by the total amount of dividends paid. The total amount of dividends paid is equal to the dividend per share multiplied by the number of shares of stock the comapny has issued. When you divide those total dividends paid by the company's market cap, the result is called the dividend yield. Because the number of shares issued by a company appears in both the numerator and denominator of that math, the dividend yield can be more simply described as result of the dividends per share divided by the company's share price.

We tapped FinViz' data visualization tools for all the companies that make up the S&P 500 index to produce the following chart plotting the market cap for each company against its dividend yield.

Looking at this chart, it seems there is an inverse relationship between the companies with the largest market capitalizatons and their dividend yield. Which is to say that as market cap rises, dividend yields get smaller.

That's somewhat misleading because what the chart is really showing is that the megacap companies tend to have some of the lowest dividend yields. Since there aren't that many companies that qualify as megacap firms, there's not much of a statistical basis to support that impression.

To see what we mean, we regenerated the chart to exclude any companies whose market caps exceeded $200 billion, which excludes megacap firms according to FinViz' definition. Here's the visual result:

Excluding the megacaps from the visualization has the effect of eliminating the appearance of a significant inverse relationship between market cap and dividend yield. While there are some high dividend yield outliers in the upper left hand corner of the chart, we recognize the firms, Dow Chemical (NYSE: DOW) and LyondellBasell Industries (NYSE: LYB) are both chemical industry firms whose stock prices have recently plunged because of distress within their industry and factors that apply uniquely for each firm. Their dividend yields can be considered to be high in this snapshot from 22 July 2025 because they haven't yet adjusted their dividends to compensate for the negative changes in their near-term prospects for profitability. [Update: Since we took this snapshot, Dow Chemical slashed its dividend.]

On the whole, we find little evidence to support an inverse relationship between market cap and dividend yield for the S&P 500's stocks. This assessment generally agrees with what others have found in looking at other stock markets.

Image credit: Microsoft Copilot Designer. Prompt: "a picture of colored circles in the style of FinViz' market cap vs dividend yield bubble chart on a black background".

The outlook for the S&P 500's dividends in the current and remaining quarters of 2025 improved in the month since we presented our previous snapshot of their future.

The amount of dividends expected to be paid out in each of these quarters has risen above the levels recorded on 13 June 2025, but by varying amounts. Both the recently ended quarter of 2025-Q2 and the now current quarter of 2025-Q3 saw small increases. The fourth quarter of 2025 however is projected to have a much larger gain than was forecast in the previous month.

Here are the projections recorded as of the close of trading on Monday, 14 July 2025.

• 2025-Q2: Increase of $0.14, rising to $19.35 per share
• 2025-Q3: Increase of $0.13, rising to $19.26 per share
• 2025-Q4: Increase of $0.49, rising to $19.76 per share

The following animated chart shows how expectations for the S&P 500's quarterly dividends per share changed in the month from 13 May 2025 to 14 July 2025. If you're reading this article on a site that republishes our RSS news feed, you may need to click through to our site to see the animation.

How changes in the outlook for dividends at specific points of time in the future contribute to changes in stock prices is described by this math.

More About Dividend Futures Data

For this series, we have been taking a snapshot of the CME Group's S&P 500 quarterly dividend futures data shortly after the second or third week of each month.

Dividend futures indicate the amount of dividends per share to be paid out over the period covered by each quarter's dividend futures contracts, which start on the day after the preceding quarter's dividend futures contracts expire and end on the third Friday of the month ending the indicated quarter. So for example, as determined by dividend futures contracts, the now "current" quarter of 2025-Q3 began on Saturday, 21 June 2025 and will end on Friday, 19 September 2025. From the perspective of dividend futures, 2025-Q4 will become the current quarter on Saturday, 22 September 2025.

Because dividend futures are tied to options contracts that run on this schedule, that makes these figures different from the quarterly dividends per share figures that are reported by Standard and Poor. S&P reports the amount of dividends per share paid out during regular calendar quarters after the end of each quarter. This term mismatch accounts for the differences in dividends reported by both sources, with the biggest differences between the two typically seen in the first and fourth quarters of each year.

Image Credit: Microsoft Copilot Designer. Prompt: "A crystal ball with the word 'SP 500' written inside it". And 'Dividends' written above it, which we added.

June 2025 was another net-negative month for the dividend paying stocks of the U.S. stock market.

That's based on the dividend metadata compiled for the entire market by Standard & Poor. When we add up all the favorable year-over-year dividend actions like dividend increases, extra dividends and resumptions during the month and then subtract all the unfavorable actions, like announced dividend decreases, the resulting single number that summarizes all the dividend changes of June 2025 is -4.

That's an improvement over the much more negative result we reported for May 2025. While still negative, the underlying data points to a mixed picture for U.S. dividend paying firms. The good news is that fewer firms announced reduced dividends than last month, which was tempered by the bad news of fewer firms announcing dividend rises.

All of June 2024's favorable and unfavorable dividend actions are tallied in the following table, which shows how much they changed since June 2024 (year-over-year) and since May 2025 (month-over-month).

The following chart tracks the monthly counts of dividend increases and decreases from January 2004 through June 2025:

The chart reveals the number of firms announcing decreased dividends in June 2025 remains well below the threshold that indicates recessionary conditions are present within the U.S. economy. However, the more-than-two-year downtrend for dividend increases shown on the chart suggests an ongoing tightening operating environment for firms, which are finding it harder to grow their dividends and, by extension, their businesses.

The next chart shows how the dividend increases and decreases reported during the just-completed 2025-Q2 compares with each of the preceding four quarters:

This chart emphasizes the year-over-year reduction in the number of dividend increases between 2024-Q2 and 2025-Q2.

References

Standard and Poor. S&P Market Attributes Web File. [Excel Spreadsheet]. Accessed 1 July 2025.

Image Credit: Microsoft Copilot Designer. Prompt: "An editorial cartoon of a Wall Street bull and bear playing a casino game in which a spinning wheel with two halves, one named 'NET POSITIVE' and the other named 'NET NEGATIVE' has settled on the 'NET NEGATIVE' side", which we followed up with a second prompt: "Add a sign labeled 'DIVIDEND METADATA' above the wheel. Also make the picture more colorful."

The outlook for the S&P 500's dividends in upcoming quarters is little changed since our previous snapshot of the future for the index' cash payouts a month ago.

The little change that has taken place however is mixed. For the three remaining quarters of 2025, expected dividends are up in the current quarter of 2025-Q2, up slightly in 2025-Q3, but down slightly in 2025-Q4. Here are the numbers recorded as of the close of trading on Monday, 16 June 2025.

• 2025-Q2: Increase of $0.14, rising to $19.21 per share
• 2025-Q3: Increase of $0.03, rising to $19.13 per share
• 2025-Q4: Decrease of $0.03, falling to $19.27 per share

The following animated chart shows how expectations for the S&P 500's quarterly dividends per share changed in the month from 15 April 2025 to 15 May 2025. If you're reading this article on a site that republishes our RSS news feed, you may need to click through to our site to see the animation.

This is the last time 2025-Q2 will be presented as a future quarter in this series. The expiration of June 2025's quarterly dividend futures contract will come with the close of trading on this upcoming Friday. We don't anticipate the projected dividends in the chart will change very much before it expires.

How changes in the outlook for dividends at specific points of time in the future contribute to changes in stock prices is described by this math.

More About Dividend Futures Data

For this series, we have been taking a snapshot of the CME Group's S&P 500 quarterly dividend futures data shortly after the second or third week of each month.

Dividend futures indicate the amount of dividends per share to be paid out over the period covered by each quarter's dividend futures contracts, which start on the day after the preceding quarter's dividend futures contracts expire and end on the third Friday of the month ending the indicated quarter. So for example, as determined by dividend futures contracts, the now "current" quarter of 2025-Q2 began on Saturday, 22 March 2025 and will end on Friday, 20 June 2025. From the perspective of dividend futures, 2025-Q3 will become the current quarter effective on Saturday, 21 June 2025.

Because dividend futures are tied to options contracts that run on this schedule, that makes these figures different from the quarterly dividends per share figures that are reported by Standard and Poor. S&P reports the amount of dividends per share paid out during regular calendar quarters after the end of each quarter. This term mismatch accounts for the differences in dividends reported by both sources, with the biggest differences between the two typically seen in the first and fourth quarters of each year.

Image Credit: Microsoft Copilot Designer. Prompt: "A crystal ball with the word 'SP 500' written inside it". And 'Dividends' written above it, which we added.

There was bad news for Wall Street's bulls for dividends last month.

May 2025 saw negative developments for dividend paying stocks in the U.S. stock market. Measured year-over-year, the number of firms acting to cut their dividends rose and the number of firms announcing dividend increases fell.

Overall, the single number that summarizes the month's dividend changes is -52. This figure represents the net amount by which a reduced number of companies announcing favorable actions like dividend increases or paying extra (or special) dividend payments to their shareholders added to the reduction in the number of firms that either cut or suspended their dividends when compared against their levels in May 2024.

All the month's favorable and unfavorable dividend actions are listed in the following table, which shows how much they changed since May 2024 (year-over-year) and since April 2025 (month-over-month).

The following chart tracks the monthly counts of dividend increases and decreases from January 2004 through May 2025:

The good news is the number of dividend reducing firms remains well below the threshold that indicates recessionary conditions are present within the U.S. economy.

But the more-than-two-years-old downward trend for dividend increases points to a different kind of continuing stress in the market.

References

Standard and Poor. S&P Market Attributes Web File. [Excel Spreadsheet]. Accessed 2 June 2025.

Image Credit: Microsoft Copilot Designer. Prompt: "An editorial cartoon of a Wall Street bull reading a newspaper with the headline 'Dividend Cuts Up, Dividend Rises Down'".

The outlook for the S&P 500's dividends in upcoming quarters has improved considerably over the month since our previous snapshot of the future.

Each of 2025's remaining quarters to be completed showed improvement. Here's the short summary of how they changed and what the expectations are as of the close of trading on Tuesday, 15 May 2025.

• 2025-Q2: Increase of $0.02, rising to $19.07 per share
• 2025-Q3: Increase of $0.14, rising to $19.10 per share
• 2025-Q4: Increase of $0.46, rising to $19.30 per share

The following animated chart shows how expectations for the S&P 500's quarterly dividends per share changed in the month from 15 April 2025 to 15 May 2025. If you're reading this article on a site that republishes our RSS news feed, you may need to click through to our site to see the animation.

The picture changes a little when we compare our May 2025 snapshot with our 14 March 2025 snapshot, which was taken before President Trump's 2 April 2025 'Liberation Day' tariff announcement. That action knocked the dividend outlook lower in its immediate aftermath, which bottomed about a week before our 15 April 2025 snapshot before beginning to recover.

As of 15 May 2025, the outlook for dividends in the current quarter of 2025-Q2 has surpassed its mid-March 2025 level by $0.22 per share. Meanwhile, expected dividends in 2025-Q3 has recovered all but $0.05 per share of its value, but 2025-Q4 remains some $0.30 per share short of its projected level from 14 March 2025.

How changes in the outlook for dividends at specific points of time in the future contribute to changes in stock prices is described by this math.

More About Dividend Futures Data

For this series, we have been taking a snapshot of the CME Group's S&P 500 quarterly dividend futures data shortly after the second or third week of each month.

Dividend futures indicate the amount of dividends per share to be paid out over the period covered by each quarter's dividend futures contracts, which start on the day after the preceding quarter's dividend futures contracts expire and end on the third Friday of the month ending the indicated quarter. So for example, as determined by dividend futures contracts, the now "current" quarter of 2025-Q2 began on Saturday, 22 March 2025 and will end on Friday, 20 June 2025.

That makes these figures different from the quarterly dividends per share figures reported by Standard and Poor. S&P reports the amount of dividends per share paid out during regular calendar quarters after the end of each quarter. This term mismatch accounts for the differences in dividends reported by both sources, with the biggest differences between the two typically seen in the first and fourth quarters of each year.

Image Credit: Microsoft Copilot Designer. Prompt: "A crystal ball with the word 'SP 500' written inside it". And 'Dividends' written above it, which we added.

Dividend paying stocks turned in a mixed performance during April 2025. The good news is that the number of stocks announcing unfavorable dividend actions dropped to its lowest level since June 2024. The bad news is the long-running trend of fewer companies announcing favorable dividend changes continued, pulling the month into the net negative column.

In the end, the single number that best summarizes the month is -20. This figure represents the net amount by which a reduced number of companies announcing favorable actions like dividend increases or paying extra (or special) dividend payments to their shareholders offset the reduction in the number of firms that either cut or suspended their dividends when compared against their levels in April 2024.

All the month's favorable and unfavorable dividend actions are tallied in the following table, which shows how much they changed both since April 2024 (year-over-year) and since March 2025 (month-over-month).

The following chart visualizes the monthly counts of dividend increases and decreases from January 2004 through April 2025.

April 2025 is the third consecutive month in which the U.S. stock market's dividend metadata has been net negative. That's the longest negative streak for U.S. dividend paying firms since a 16-month long period during which the market's dividend metadata was net negative in 15 months, which ran from June 2022 through September 2023. That period coincidentally falls within the 2022-2024 earnings recession for the S&P 500.

References

Standard and Poor. S&P Market Attributes Web File. [Excel Spreadsheet]. Accessed 1 May 2025.

Image credit: Microsoft Copilot Designer. Prompt: "An editorial cartoon of a Wall Street bear playing a casino game called 'Net Negative' and losing". We tweaked the text on the "Net Negative" sign to make it "Fabulous" and to take it out of Nevada.