In the first quarter of 2011, 117 stocks in the S&P 500 index either initiated a dividend or increased their dividend. That's up 50% from last year.
With this dividend announcement, Yamana Gold will have increased their annual dividend payment by 200% over 2009.
It’s hard to ignore the fact that higher gold prices are leading to bigger dividends and investors need to at least consider gold stocks for their portfolio.
Here is a look at the 10 stocks initiating dividends in 2010.
We likely will not see any dividend increases from financial stocks until at least the second half of this year and probably not until 2011.