Dividend paying firms in the U.S. stock market saw more negative than positive changes in November 2025 when compared against the market of November 2024. That's disappointing because October 2025 saw dividend payers break an eight-month-long losing streak for this simple measure that indicates the relative health of the underlying U.S. economy by turning in a positive result.
Alas, there is no new winning streak taking hold. The single number that describes how dividend payers fared during the month is -22, with that many more unfavorable actions outweighing the kind of favorable actions that the owners of dividend paying stocks like to see.
Falling back into the recent pattern of the eight month-long losing streak, this net outcome was the result of a declining number of favorable changes like dividend increases and announcements of extra (or special) dividends payments for shareholders. Overall, there were 28 fewer favorable actions in November 2025 than there were in the same month a year earlier, of which, there were 19 fewer extra dividends and 9 fewer increases than had been announced in November 2024.
These unfavorable changes outweighed the favorable development of fewer companies decreasing their dividend payouts. There were just 10 such firms counted by Standard & Poor in its tally for November 2025, a decrease of 6 from the total recorded a year earlier.
The following table totals up all the favorable and unfavorable dividend actions for November 2025 and compares the figures with the values recorded for October 2025 and November 2024 to reveal how they changed month-over-month (MoM) and year-over-year (YoY):
| Dividend Changes in November 2025 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nov-2025 | Oct-2025 | MoM | Nov-2024 | YoY | |
| Total Declarations | 4,948 | 4,563 | 385 ▲ | 4,108 | 840 ▲ |
| Favorable | 193 | 197 | -4 ▼ | 221 | -28 ▼ |
| - Increases | 134 | 148 | -14 ▼ | 143 | -9 ▼ |
| - Special/Extra | 59 | 49 | 10 ▲ | 78 | -19 ▼ |
| - Resumed | 0 | 0 | 0 ◀▶ | 0 | 0 ◀▶ |
| Unfavorable | 10 | 7 | 3 ▲ | 16 | -6 ▼ |
| - Decreases | 10 | 7 | 3 ▲ | 16 | -6 ▼ |
| - Omitted/Passed | 0 | 0 | 0 ◀▶ | 0 | 0 ◀▶ |
The following chart visualizes the monthly counts of dividend increases and decreases from January 2004 through November 2025.
The bottom line? While November 2025's dividend metadata contained some positive developments, they were overshadowed, resulting in a net negative outcome for dividend paying companies in the U.S. stock market.
References
Standard and Poor. S&P Market Attributes Web File. [Excel Spreadsheet]. Accessed 1 December 2025.
Image credit: Microsoft Copilot Designer. Prompt: "An editorial cartoon of a Wall Street bear dressed as a hockey goalie blocking shots by a skating Wall Street bull dressed as a hockey player trying to score goals in a net that says 'FAVORABLE DIVIDEND CHANGES'".
Labels: dividends
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