We thought it might be fun to take a quick look into the expected future for the S&P 500's quarterly dividends per share. The following chart shows what we saw when we looked into the CME Group's crystal ball for the S&P 500's dividend futures.
We've only become able to see through to the end of 2021 during the last two weeks. One important thing to know about these forecasts is that they correspond to dividends expected to be paid out by S&P 500 firms during the periods covered by futures contracts, which run from the end of the third Friday of the month preceding the indicated calendar quarter, through the third Friday of the month ending the indicated calendar quarter.
That makes them different from the quarterly dividends per share for the S&P 500 reported by Standard and Poor after the end of each quarter, which corresponds directly with the dividends that were paid out during the three months that make up a calendar quarter.
References
CME Group. S&P 500 Quarterly Dividend Index Futures Quotes. [Online Database]. Accessed 8 July 2020.
CME Group. S&P 500 Annual Dividend Index Futures Quotes. [Online Database]. Accessed 8 July 2020.
Standard and Poor. S&P 500 Index Earnings. [Excel Spreadsheet]. Quarterly dividends for S&P 500 updated on first business day following end of calendar quarter.