The DivGro Weekly—17.04.26
216 Consecutive dividend increases
Weekly Dividend Progress
This week we received further real-time, tangible evidence of outstanding business progress when Costco increased its dividend by 13.1%. We collected our quarterly dividend from Constellation Software and also became entitled to our quarterly dividends from Abbott, Intuit and Mastercard, meaningfully higher than this time last year.
How We Are Tracking
Since DivGro's inception we have predicted and benefited from 216 consecutive dividend increases across our portfolio companies, with no decreases. The average rate of these dividend increases is 14%.
Distribution
Next week, we will pay our 26th consecutive quarterly distribution. Notably, this distribution is 12.9% higher than the same time last year. DivGro has grown its distributions each year by at least a double-digit percentage increase. Our quarterly distribution is already 3x higher than our first quarterly distribution paid in January 2020.
DivGro in the Press
We recently featured on Investing Secrets: Invest Like the Top 0.1%. The podcast episode is available on Apple and Spotify.
Costco
This week, Costco raised its dividend for the 21st consecutive year, this time by 13.1%. Its timeless appeal to more than 140-million cardholders is straightforward: every day, in every warehouse, Costco offers the lowest possible prices on thousands of high-quality food and general merchandise items in exchange for a modest annual fee of circa $70 (which customers usually recoup on their first post-renewal annual visit). Costco’s price proposition presents a mammoth task for any aspirant competitor to attempt to match. Given Costco is founded upon a belief in charging the least and providing maximum value, it is especially challenging, if not impossible, to shift the lowest-cost incumbent. Just look to its famous hot dogs, whose prices have remained unchanged for more than 30 years. On the basis that Costco continues to fiercely protect its customer value proposition, its likely course is to continue to roll out more warehouses globally, adding more members, consolidating its position as the largest purchaser of the products it offers, raising profits and thus enabling the continuity of its impressive dividend growth record.