Caisse Régionale de Crédit Agricole Mutuel Alpes Provence Société coopérative (EPA:CRAP) Is Increasing Its Dividend To €4.14

Caisse Régionale de Crédit Agricole Mutuel Alpes Provence Société coopérative (EPA:CRAP) has announced that it will be increasing its periodic dividend on the 23rd of April to €4.14, which will be 11% higher than last year's comparable payment amount of €3.72. Even though the dividend went up, the yield is still quite low at only 3.9%.

Check out our latest analysis for Caisse Régionale de Crédit Agricole Mutuel Alpes Provence Société coopérative

Caisse Régionale de Crédit Agricole Mutuel Alpes Provence Société coopérative's Earnings Will Easily Cover The Distributions

The dividend yield is a little bit low, but sustainability of the payments is also an important part of evaluating an income stock.

Caisse Régionale de Crédit Agricole Mutuel Alpes Provence Société coopérative has a long history of paying out dividends, with its current track record at a minimum of 10 years. Using data from its latest earnings report, Caisse Régionale de Crédit Agricole Mutuel Alpes Provence Société coopérative's payout ratio sits at 22%, an extremely comfortable number that shows that it can pay its dividend.

Over the next year, EPS could expand by 8.6% if recent trends continue. If the dividend continues along recent trends, we estimate the future payout ratio will be 22%, which is in the range that makes us comfortable with the sustainability of the dividend.

Dividend Volatility

The company has a long dividend track record, but it doesn't look great with cuts in the past. Since 2015, the dividend has gone from €3.33 total annually to €3.72. This means that it has been growing its distributions at 1.1% per annum over that time. It's encouraging to see some dividend growth, but the dividend has been cut at least once, and the size of the cut would eliminate most of the growth anyway, which makes this less attractive as an income investment.

We Could See Caisse Régionale de Crédit Agricole Mutuel Alpes Provence Société coopérative's Dividend Growing

With a relatively unstable dividend, it's even more important to see if earnings per share is growing. We are encouraged to see that Caisse Régionale de Crédit Agricole Mutuel Alpes Provence Société coopérative has grown earnings per share at 8.6% per year over the past five years. With a decent amount of growth and a low payout ratio, we think this bodes well for Caisse Régionale de Crédit Agricole Mutuel Alpes Provence Société coopérative's prospects of growing its dividend payments in the future.

We Really Like Caisse Régionale de Crédit Agricole Mutuel Alpes Provence Société coopérative's Dividend

Overall, a dividend increase is always good, and we think that Caisse Régionale de Crédit Agricole Mutuel Alpes Provence Société coopérative is a strong income stock thanks to its track record and growing earnings. Earnings are easily covering distributions, and the company is generating plenty of cash. All in all, this checks a lot of the boxes we look for when choosing an income stock.

Investors generally tend to favour companies with a consistent, stable dividend policy as opposed to those operating an irregular one. At the same time, there are other factors our readers should be conscious of before pouring capital into a stock. As an example, we've identified 2 warning signs for Caisse Régionale de Crédit Agricole Mutuel Alpes Provence Société coopérative that you should be aware of before investing. Is Caisse Régionale de Crédit Agricole Mutuel Alpes Provence Société coopérative not quite the opportunity you were looking for? Why not check out our selection of top dividend stocks.

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This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.