Something To Consider Before Buying Daehan Flour Mills Co.,Ltd (KRX:001130) For The 1.4% Dividend

Is Daehan Flour Mills Co.,Ltd (KRX:001130) a good dividend stock? How can we tell? Dividend paying companies with growing earnings can be highly rewarding in the long term. If you are hoping to live on the income from dividends, it's important to be a lot more stringent with your investments than the average punter.

A 1.4% yield is nothing to get excited about, but investors probably think the long payment history suggests Daehan Flour MillsLtd has some staying power. Some simple analysis can reduce the risk of holding Daehan Flour MillsLtd for its dividend, and we'll focus on the most important aspects below.

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Payout ratios

Dividends are typically paid from company earnings. If a company pays more in dividends than it earned, then the dividend might become unsustainable - hardly an ideal situation. So we need to form a view on if a company's dividend is sustainable, relative to its net profit after tax. In the last year, Daehan Flour MillsLtd paid out 12% of its profit as dividends. We like this low payout ratio, because it implies the dividend is well covered and leaves ample opportunity for reinvestment.

In addition to comparing dividends against profits, we should inspect whether the company generated enough cash to pay its dividend. Last year, Daehan Flour MillsLtd paid a dividend while reporting negative free cash flow. While there may be an explanation, we think this behaviour is generally not sustainable.

With a strong net cash balance, Daehan Flour MillsLtd investors may not have much to worry about in the near term from a dividend perspective.

We update our data on Daehan Flour MillsLtd every 24 hours, so you can always get our latest analysis of its financial health, here.

Dividend Volatility

Before buying a stock for its income, we want to see if the dividends have been stable in the past, and if the company has a track record of maintaining its dividend. Daehan Flour MillsLtd has been paying dividends for a long time, but for the purpose of this analysis, we only examine the past 10 years of payments. The dividend has been cut on at least one occasion historically. During the past 10-year period, the first annual payment was ₩3.3k in 2011, compared to ₩2.0k last year. The dividend has shrunk at around 4.7% a year during that period. Daehan Flour MillsLtd's dividend hasn't shrunk linearly at 4.7% per annum, but the CAGR is a useful estimate of the historical rate of change.

We struggle to make a case for buying Daehan Flour MillsLtd for its dividend, given that payments have shrunk over the past 10 years.

Dividend Growth Potential

With a relatively unstable dividend, it's even more important to evaluate if earnings per share (EPS) are growing - it's not worth taking the risk on a dividend getting cut, unless you might be rewarded with larger dividends in future. Earnings have grown at around 3.8% a year for the past five years, which is better than seeing them shrink! Growth has been hard to come by. On the plus side, the dividend payout ratio is low and dividends could grow faster than earnings, if the company decides to increase its payout ratio.

Conclusion

When we look at a dividend stock, we need to form a judgement on whether the dividend will grow, if the company is able to maintain it in a wide range of economic circumstances, and if the dividend payout is sustainable. Daehan Flour MillsLtd has a low payout ratio, which we like, although it paid out virtually all of its generated cash. Second, earnings growth has been ordinary, and its history of dividend payments is chequered - having cut its dividend at least once in the past. In sum, we find it hard to get excited about Daehan Flour MillsLtd from a dividend perspective. It's not that we think it's a bad business; just that there are other companies that perform better on these criteria.

Companies possessing a stable dividend policy will likely enjoy greater investor interest than those suffering from a more inconsistent approach. Meanwhile, despite the importance of dividend payments, they are not the only factors our readers should know when assessing a company. To that end, Daehan Flour MillsLtd has 2 warning signs (and 1 which is a bit unpleasant) we think you should know about.

We have also put together a list of global stocks with a market capitalisation above $1bn and yielding more 3%.

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This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. 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.
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