How has the expected future changed for the quarterly dividends of the S&P 500 (Index: SPX) in the month since our previous snapshot?
As of 15 April 2026, the outlook for the S&P 500's quarterly dividends through the end of 2026 and the first quarter of 2027 has improved considerably over the past month. Here is our summary of how the outlook for the S&P 500's quarterly dividends per share changed since our 13 March 2026 snapshot:
- 2026-Q2: Increase of $0.21 to $19.77 per share
- 2026-Q3: Increase of $0.25 to $20.48 per share
- 2026-Q4: Increase of $0.27 to $20.38 per share
- 2027-Q1: Increase of $0.55 to $21.74 per share
Not all the dividend futures data was rosy. On the day the dividend futures contract for 2026-Q1 ended on Friday, 20 March 2026, the expected dividend payout for 2026-Q1 plunged by $0.26 per share to a final value of $21.20 per share for the now-ended quarter.
The following chart shows how expectations for the S&P 500's quarterly dividends per share changed in the month from 13 March 2026 to 15 April 2026.
We're going to a rolling 13 quarter presentation for this chart, which for this edition, covers 2024-Q2 through 2027-Q1, and gives us a first look at the dividend expectations for 2027-Q2. The first projection of that most distant future quarter of this outlook is $20.06 per share, which is $0.29 higher than the $19.77 per share expected for the current quarter of 2026-Q2.
If this is your first exposure to the S&P 500's quarterly dividend futures, be sure to read the following section that explains what this data is communicating about the future for the index' dividends.
More About Dividend Futures Data
For this series, we take 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. For example, as determined by dividend futures contracts, the now "current" quarter of 2026-Q2 began on Saturday, 21 March 2026 and will end on Friday, 19 June 2026. Since the expectations for this quarter's dividend payouts can change all the way up to that final date, it qualifies as a future quarter.
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.
Dividend futures data is important for more than just what they project will be a future quarter's dividend payout. They represent the quantified expectations investors have for the future income they will realize from holding their investments, which affects how investors set current day stock prices. How changes in the outlook for dividends at specific points of time in the future contribute to changes in current day stock prices is described by this math.
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.
Labels: dividends, forecasting, SP 500
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