NortonLifeLock (NASDAQ:NLOK) Has Announced A Dividend Of US$0.13

NortonLifeLock Inc.'s (NASDAQ:NLOK) investors are due to receive a payment of US$0.13 per share on 22nd of June. This means the annual payment is 2.1% of the current stock price, which is above the average for the industry.

See our latest analysis for NortonLifeLock

NortonLifeLock's Earnings Easily Cover the Distributions

If the payments aren't sustainable, a high yield for a few years won't matter that much. Before making this announcement, NortonLifeLock was easily earning enough to cover the dividend. This means that most of its earnings are being retained to grow the business.

Looking forward, earnings per share is forecast to rise by 20.2% over the next year. If the dividend continues along recent trends, we estimate the payout ratio will be 29%, which is in the range that makes us comfortable with the sustainability of the dividend.

NortonLifeLock's Dividend Has Lacked Consistency

NortonLifeLock has been paying dividends for a while, but the track record isn't stellar. This suggests that the dividend might not be the most reliable. Since 2013, the dividend has gone from US$0.60 to US$0.50. Doing the maths, this is a decline of about 2.0% per year. Generally, we don't like to see a dividend that has been declining over time as this can degrade shareholders' returns and indicate that the company may be running into problems.

The Dividend Looks Likely To Grow

Given that the dividend has been cut in the past, we need to check if earnings are growing and if that might lead to stronger dividends in the future. NortonLifeLock has impressed us by growing EPS at 25% per year over the past five years. Earnings have been growing rapidly, and with a low payout ratio we think that the company could turn out to be a great dividend stock.

NortonLifeLock Looks Like A Great Dividend Stock

In summary, it is good to see that the dividend is staying consistent, and we don't think there is any reason to suspect this might change over the medium term. Distributions are quite easily covered by earnings, which are also being converted to cash flows. All in all, this checks a lot of the boxes we look for when choosing an income stock.

Companies possessing a stable dividend policy will likely enjoy greater investor interest than those suffering from a more inconsistent approach. However, there are other things to consider for investors when analysing stock performance. Case in point: We've spotted 4 warning signs for NortonLifeLock (of which 1 is concerning!) you should know about. If you are a dividend investor, you might also want to look at our curated list of high yield dividend stocks.

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