If Apple Inc. (Nasdaq: AAPL) actually does what many now expect - raise the Apple stock dividend as much as 56% - it could help inspire a trend of givebacks by other cash-rich companies.
Looking at the company's cash hoard of $137 billion - which could reach $170 billion by year's end - a survey of analysts conducted by Bloomberg News this week concluded that an Apple stock dividend hike of $4.14 a share is a likely possibility.
That would raise the stock's yield from about 2.40% now to a much more attractive 3.6% -
higher than 84% of the other dividend-paying companies in the Standard & Poor's 500 Index.
An increase in the Apple stock dividend would almost certainly boost the stock price, which is down about 35% from its Sept. 19 high of $702.10.
"The accumulation of cash has become excessive," Brian White, an analyst at New York-based Topeka Capital Markets Inc., told Bloomberg. "It doesn't matter which bearish scenario you forecast, they're never going to need this much cash."
Apple Stock Dividend Could Set Tone for 2013
But Apple isn't the only U.S. company sitting on billions of dollars that shareholders would like to see returned to them.
According to Moody's, cash hoards at non-financial U.S. companies rose to $1.45 trillion by the end of 2012.
Apple tops the list by far, but five other tech companies landed in the top 10.
These companies face the same kind of investor pressure to pay them off that has been directed at Apple. If we do see an Apple stock dividend in the near future, such companies will feel even more pressure to return money to shareholders.
Here are the top 10 cash kings as of Dec. 31, 2012:
- Apple Inc.: $137.1 billion (2.40% yield)
- Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq: MSFT): $68.3 billion (3.30% yield)
- Google Inc. (Nasdaq: GOOG): $48.1 billion (no dividend)
- Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE): $46.9 billion (3.40% yield)
- Cisco Inc. (Nasdaq: CSCO): $46.4 billion (2.60% yield)
- Oracle Corp. (Nasdaq: ORCL): $33.7 billion (0.7% yield)
- Qualcomm Inc. (Nasdaq: QCOM): $28.4 billion (1.50% yield)
- General Motors Co. (NYSE: GM): $27.4 billion (no dividend)
- Amgen Inc. (Nasdaq: AMGN): $24.1 billion (2.0% yield)
- Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F): $22.9 billion (3.0% yield)
Companies often resist shareholder payouts because they see a large stockpile of cash as an insurance policy against a weak economy, a means to re-invest in the business or ammunition for strategic acquisitions.
And one complicating factor is that many companies hold most of their cash overseas, having left profits there to avoid the 35% U.S. corporate tax they'd have to pay if they brought it home.
But when cash just sits on a company's balance sheet quarter after quarter, many investors simply see it as money that is rightfully theirs.
Dividends or Buybacks?
The more cash a company accumulates, the more vocal its stockholders become in their quest to encourage the company to share some of it.
Apple, of course, is the ultimate example.
Activist investor David Einhorn, who heads the Greenlight Capital hedge fund, created a major stir last month when he sued Apple over a shareholder ballot proposal that threatened to quash his idea to for the company to create preferred shares for existing investors that would pay a higher dividend.
Stockholders prefer dividends, but many also will accept share buybacks as way to reward investors, as the buybacks reduce the shares outstanding and, in theory at least, boost the value of the remaining shares.
Some Apple investors have pushed for buybacks.
"I'm with Warren Buffett on this," Chuck Jones, a principal atSand Hill Insights,told Forbes. "If you're stock is being discounted, go buy it."
Buffett has made several public statements recently suggesting that Apple should buy back shares while the stock price is depressed.
Apple conceivably could increase its dividend and buy back shares, but investors would be most pleased by a fat increase in the Apple stock dividend.
And that would surely get the attention of antsy shareholders of all the other cash-rich companies.
"You need to attract new investors, and I think one way to do that is to pay out a bigger dividend," White told Bloomberg.
Related Articles and News:
- Money Morning:
7 Dividend Stocks with 50 Years of Increasing Payouts - Money Morning:
Why David Einhorn Needed to Sue Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) - Bloomberg:
Apple Seen Raising Dividend More Than 50% - Forbes:
As Anniversary of Dividend, Buyback Nears, Investors Want Apple To Show Them the Money - MarketWatch:
Apple cash hoard could hit $170 billion this year: Moody's
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About the Author
David Zeiler, Associate Editor for Money Morning at Money Map Press, has been a journalist for more than 35 years, including 18 spent at The Baltimore Sun. He has worked as a writer, editor, and page designer at different times in his career. He's interviewed a number of well-known personalities - ranging from punk rock icon Joey Ramone to Apple Inc. co-founder Steve Wozniak.
Over the course of his journalistic career, Dave has covered many diverse subjects. Since arriving at Money Morning in 2011, he has focused primarily on technology. He's an expert on both Apple and cryptocurrencies. He started writing about Apple for The Sun in the mid-1990s, and had an Apple blog on The Sun's web site from 2007-2009. Dave's been writing about Bitcoin since 2011 - long before most people had even heard of it. He even mined it for a short time.
Dave has a BA in English and Mass Communications from Loyola University Maryland.