Future Dividend Aristocrat Enterprise Products Partners announces second dividend hike in 2023
For the second time this year Enterprise Products Partners (EPD) announced a small dividend hike with a 2.0% increase to $0.50 quarterly per share. This brings the total dividend increase to 5.3% YTD with EPD hiking the dividend by a total of 5.6% in 2022. The MLP Has now raised its dividend for 25 consecutive years and has reached dividend aristocrat status in 2023.
Enterprise Products Partners L.P. (EPD) announced today that the board of directors of its general partner declared a quarterly cash distribution to be paid to Enterprise common unitholders with respect to the second quarter of 2023 of $0.50 per unit, or $2.00 per unit on an annualized basis.
This quarterly distribution will be paid August 14, 2023, to common unitholders of record as of the close of business July 31, 2023. This distribution represents a 5.3 percent increase over the distribution declared with regard to the second quarter of 2022 and a 2.0 percent increase over the distribution declared for the first quarter of 2023. This year marks the partnership’s 25th consecutive year of distribution growth.
Enterprise repurchased 2.9 million of its common units in the open market during the second quarter of 2023 for a total purchase price of approximately $75 million. Inclusive of these purchases, the partnership has utilized 41 percent of its authorized $2.0 billion buyback program.
The dividend yield for EPD is 7.4% at a stock price of $26.44. With a $4.3 billion annual dividend payment the company is one of the biggest dividend payers in the United States. It's possible that EPD will be an offical Dividend Aristocrat in 2024 with VF Corp cutting the dividend in 2023 and being deleted from the Index. Also, dividend cuts are looming for several other companies including 3M.
Enterprise Products Partners L.P. is one of the largest publicly traded partnerships and a leading North American provider of midstream energy services to producers and consumers of natural gas, NGLs, crude oil, refined products and petrochemicals. Services include: natural gas gathering, treating, processing, transportation and storage; NGL transportation, fractionation, storage and marine terminals; crude oil gathering, transportation, storage and marine terminals; petrochemical and refined products transportation, storage and marine terminals; and a marine transportation business that operates on key U.S. inland and intracoastal waterway systems. The partnership’s assets currently include more than 50,000 miles of pipelines; over 260 million barrels of storage capacity for NGLs, crude oil, petrochemicals and refined products; and 14 billion cubic feet of natural gas storage capacity.
