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Regular readers will know that we love our dividends at Simply Wall St, which is why it's exciting to see Crown Crafts, Inc. (NASDAQ:CRWS) is about to trade ex-dividend in the next 4 days. You can purchase shares before the 11th of March in order to receive the dividend, which the company will pay on the 2nd of April.
Crown Crafts's upcoming dividend is US$0.08 a share, following on from the last 12 months, when the company distributed a total of US$0.57 per share to shareholders. Calculating the last year's worth of payments shows that Crown Crafts has a trailing yield of 7.3% on the current share price of $7.81. Dividends are a major contributor to investment returns for long term holders, but only if the dividend continues to be paid. As a result, readers should always check whether Crown Crafts has been able to grow its dividends, or if the dividend might be cut.
Check out our latest analysis for Crown Crafts
Dividends are usually paid out of company profits, so if a company pays out more than it earned then its dividend is usually at greater risk of being cut. Crown Crafts paid out a comfortable 33% of its profit last year. Yet cash flows are even more important than profits for assessing a dividend, so we need to see if the company generated enough cash to pay its distribution. It distributed 29% of its free cash flow as dividends, a comfortable payout level for most companies.
It's encouraging to see that the dividend is covered by both profit and cash flow. This generally suggests the dividend is sustainable, as long as earnings don't drop precipitously.
Click here to see how much of its profit Crown Crafts paid out over the last 12 months.
Have Earnings And Dividends Been Growing?
Stocks in companies that generate sustainable earnings growth often make the best dividend prospects, as it is easier to lift the dividend when earnings are rising. If earnings decline and the company is forced to cut its dividend, investors could watch the value of their investment go up in smoke. With that in mind, we're encouraged by the steady growth at Crown Crafts, with earnings per share up 5.1% on average over the last five years. Management have been reinvested more than half of the company's earnings within the business, and the company has been able to grow earnings with this retained capital. Organisations that reinvest heavily in themselves typically get stronger over time, which can bring attractive benefits such as stronger earnings and dividends.
The main way most investors will assess a company's dividend prospects is by checking the historical rate of dividend growth. In the past 10 years, Crown Crafts has increased its dividend at approximately 22% a year on average. We're glad to see dividends rising alongside earnings over a number of years, which may be a sign the company intends to share the growth with shareholders.