Exelon (EXC) Could Be a Great Choice

Whether it's through stocks, bonds, ETFs, or other types of securities, all investors love seeing their portfolios score big returns. However, when you're an income investor, your primary focus is generating consistent cash flow from each of your liquid investments.

While cash flow can come from bond interest or interest from other types of investments, income investors hone in on dividends. A dividend is that coveted distribution of a company's earnings paid out to shareholders, and investors often view it by its dividend yield, a metric that measures the dividend as a percent of the current stock price. Many academic studies show that dividends make up large portions of long-term returns, and in many cases, dividend contributions surpass one-third of total returns.

Exelon in Focus

Exelon (EXC) is headquartered in Chicago, and is in the Utilities sector. The stock has seen a price change of 13.18% since the start of the year. The energy company is currently shelling out a dividend of $0.4 per share, with a dividend yield of 3.76%. This compares to the Utility - Electric Power industry's yield of 3.27% and the S&P 500's yield of 1.62%.

Taking a look at the company's dividend growth, its current annualized dividend of $1.60 is up 5.3% from last year. Exelon has increased its dividend 3 times on a year-over-year basis over the last 5 years for an average annual increase of 0.01%. Looking ahead, future dividend growth will be dependent on earnings growth and payout ratio, which is the proportion of a company's annual earnings per share that it pays out as a dividend. Right now, Exelon's payout ratio is 58%, which means it paid out 58% of its trailing 12-month EPS as dividend.

Earnings growth looks solid for EXC for this fiscal year. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for 2025 is $2.70 per share, representing a year-over-year earnings growth rate of 8%.

Bottom Line

Investors like dividends for a variety of different reasons, from tax advantages and decreasing overall portfolio risk to considerably improving stock investing profits. It's important to keep in mind that not all companies provide a quarterly payout.

Big, established firms that have more secure profits are often seen as the best dividend options, but it's fairly uncommon to see high-growth businesses or tech start-ups offer their stockholders a dividend. Income investors must be conscious of the fact that high-yielding stocks tend to struggle during periods of rising interest rates. That said, they can take comfort from the fact that EXC is not only an attractive dividend play, but also represents a compelling investment opportunity with a Zacks Rank of #2 (Buy).

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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

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