How Does IBF Financial Holdings Co., Ltd. (TPE:2889) Fare As A Dividend Stock?

Could IBF Financial Holdings Co., Ltd. (TPE:2889) be an attractive dividend share to own for the long haul? Investors are often drawn to strong companies with the idea of reinvesting the dividends. If you are hoping to live on your dividends, it's important to be more stringent with your investments than the average punter. Regular readers know we like to apply the same approach to each dividend stock, and we hope you'll find our analysis useful.

A high yield and a long history of paying dividends is an appealing combination for IBF Financial Holdings. We'd guess that plenty of investors have purchased it for the income. That said, the recent jump in the share price will make IBF Financial Holdings's dividend yield look smaller, even though the company prospects could be improving. Some simple analysis can offer a lot of insights when buying a company for its dividend, and we'll go through this below.

Explore this interactive chart for our latest analysis on IBF Financial Holdings!

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. As a result, we should always investigate whether a company can afford its dividend, measured as a percentage of a company's net income after tax. Looking at the data, we can see that 58% of IBF Financial Holdings' profits were paid out as dividends in the last 12 months. A payout ratio above 50% generally implies a business is reaching maturity, although it is still possible to reinvest in the business or increase the dividend over time.

Consider getting our latest analysis on IBF Financial Holdings' financial position here.

Dividend Volatility

One of the major risks of relying on dividend income, is the potential for a company to struggle financially and cut its dividend. Not only is your income cut, but the value of your investment declines as well - nasty. For the purpose of this article, we only scrutinise the last decade of IBF Financial Holdings' dividend payments. The dividend has been cut on at least one occasion historically. During the past 10-year period, the first annual payment was NT$0.3 in 2011, compared to NT$0.7 last year. This works out to be a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of approximately 7.6% a year over that time. The dividends haven't grown at precisely 7.6% every year, but this is a useful way to average out the historical rate of growth.

A reasonable rate of dividend growth is good to see, but we're wary that the dividend history is not as solid as we'd like, having been cut at least once.

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. It's good to see IBF Financial Holdings has been growing its earnings per share at 16% a year over the past five years. IBF Financial Holdings' earnings per share have grown rapidly in recent years, although more than half of its profits are being paid out as dividends, which makes us wonder if the company has a limited number of reinvestment opportunities in its business.

Conclusion

To summarise, shareholders should always check that IBF Financial Holdings' dividends are affordable, that its dividend payments are relatively stable, and that it has decent prospects for growing its earnings and dividend. IBF Financial Holdings' payout ratio is within normal bounds. We were also glad to see it growing earnings, but it was concerning to see the dividend has been cut at least once in the past. While we're not hugely bearish on it, overall we think there are potentially better dividend stocks than IBF Financial Holdings out there.

Companies possessing a stable dividend policy will likely enjoy greater investor interest than those suffering from a more inconsistent approach. Still, investors need to consider a host of other factors, apart from dividend payments, when analysing a company. Just as an example, we've come accross 3 warning signs for IBF Financial Holdings you should be aware of, and 1 of them shouldn't be ignored.

Looking for more high-yielding dividend ideas? Try our curated list of dividend stocks with a yield above 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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