The board of Gilead Sciences, Inc. (NASDAQ:GILD) has announced that it will be paying its dividend of $0.77 on the 28th of March, an increased payment from last year’s comparable dividend. This will take the annual payment to 4.2% of the stock price, which is above what most companies in the industry pay.
View our latest analysis for Gilead Sciences
Gilead Sciences’ Earnings Easily Cover The Distributions
We like to see robust dividend yields, but that doesn’t matter if the payment isn’t sustainable. Based on the last payment, Gilead Sciences was quite comfortably earning enough to cover the dividend. This indicates that quite a large proportion of earnings is being invested back into the business.
Looking forward, earnings per share is forecast to rise by 32.5% over the next year. If the dividend continues along recent trends, we estimate the payout ratio will be 55%, which is in the range that makes us comfortable with the…
