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CHAPTER 7DIVIDENDS AND SHARE REPURCHASES: ANALYSISPresenter’s namePresenter’s titledd Month yyyy
Copyright © 2013 CFA Institute 2
1. INTRODUCTION
A payout policy is a set of principles regarding a corporation’s distributions to shareholders.
- May be established with regard to a dividend payout, a dividend per share, a growth in dividend per share, or any other metric.
- May include stock splits and stock dividends.
- May include stock repurchases.
Copyright © 2013 CFA Institute 3
2. DIVIDEND POLICY AND COMPANY VALUE: THEORY
Dividends Are Irrelevant
• Based on MM theories.
• If owners want a leveraged position, they can make it themselves.
Bird in the Hand
• Cash dividends are more certain than stock appreciation.
Tax Argument
• How dividends are taxed relative to capital gains affects investors preferences for dividends.
Other
• Clientele effect.
• Signaling.• Agency cost
effects.
Copyright © 2013 CFA Institute 4
DIVIDENDS ARE IRRELEVANT
In Miller and Modigliani’s (MM) world with no taxes, no transaction costs, and homogeneous information, dividend policy does not affect the value of the company.
- The decision of how a company finances its business is separate from the decision of what and how much to invest in capital projects.
- If an investor wants cash flow, he/she could sell some shares.
- If an investor wants more risk, he/she could borrow to invest.
- An investor is indifferent about a share repurchase or a dividend.
Bottom line: Dividend policy does not affect a firm’s value.
Copyright © 2013 CFA Institute 5
THE BIRD-IN-THE-HAND ARGUMENT
• Investors prefer a cash dividend to uncertain capital gains.
- Hence, investors prefer the “bird in the hand.”
- Issue: Riskiness of the stock appreciation.
• If this explanation holds, a company that pays a cash dividend will have a higher value than a similar company that does not pay a cash dividend.
Bottom line: Dividend policy affects the value of the firm.
Copyright © 2013 CFA Institute 6
THE TAX ARGUMENT
If dividends are taxed at a rate higher than capital gains, investors prefer that companies reinvest cash flow back into the firm.
- In other words, investors prefer the lower-taxed capital gains to the higher-taxed cash dividends.
- This advocates a zero dividend payout when dividends are taxed at a rate higher than that of capital gains.
Bottom line: Dividend policy affects the value of the firm.
Copyright © 2013 CFA Institute 7
THE CLIENTELE EFFECT
• The clientele effect is the influence of groups of investors attracted to companies with specific dividend policies.
- Clientele are simply a group of investors who have the same preference.
• Types of clientele:
- If an investor has a marginal tax on capital gains lower than the marginal tax on dividends, the investor prefers a return in the form of capital gains.
- Investors who are tax exempt (e.g., pension funds) are indifferent about dividends and capital gains.
- Some investors, by policy or restrictions, only invest in stocks that pay dividends.
• The importance of the existence of clientele is that investors will have a preference for stocks with a specific dividend policy.
Bottom line: The clientele effect does not necessarily imply that dividends affect value.
Copyright © 2013 CFA Institute 8
DIVIDENDS AND SIGNALING
• Under MM’s theory, everyone has the same information.
• When there is asymmetric information, dividend changes may convey information.
Positive Information• Dividend initiations• Dividend increases
Negative Information• Dividend omissions• Dividend reductions
Copyright © 2013 CFA Institute 9
AGENCY COSTS AND DIVIDEND POLICY
• The separation of ownership and management in a corporation may lead to suboptimal investment.
- Management may invest in negative NPV projects to enhance the company’s size or management’s control.
• Jensen’s free cash flow hypothesis is that having free cash flow tempts management to make investments that are not positive NPV.
- Paying dividends or interest on debt uses this free cash flow and averts an agency issue.
• If a company’s debt has a restriction on paying dividends, it may avoid the issue of paying dividends (thus benefiting owners) and may increase the risk to bondholders.
Bottom line: Dividends may reduce agency costs and, therefore, increase the value of the firm.
Copyright © 2013 CFA Institute 10
3. FACTORS AFFECTING DIVIDEND POLICY
Investment Opportunities
Expected Volatility of
Future Earnings
Financial Flexibility
Tax Considerations
Flotation CostsContractual and
Legal Restrictions
Copyright © 2013 CFA Institute 11
FACTORS AFFECTING DIVIDEND POLICY
• Investment opportunities:
- A company with more investment opportunities will pay out less in dividends.
- A company with fewer investment opportunities will pay out more in dividends.
• Expected volatility of future earnings:
- Companies with greater earnings volatility are less likely to increase dividends—a greater chance of not maintaining the increased dividend.
• Financial flexibility:
- Companies seeking more flexibility are less likely to pay dividends or to increase dividends because they want to preserve cash.
Copyright © 2013 CFA Institute 12
FACTORS AFFECTING DIVIDEND POLICY
• Tax considerations
- The tax rate on dividends and how dividends are taxed relative to capital gains affect investors’ preferences and, hence, companies’ dividend policy.
• Flotation costs
- These costs make it more expensive to use newly issued stock instead of internally generated funds.
- Smaller companies face higher flotation costs.
• Contractual and legal restrictions
- Forms of restrictions:
- Impairment of capital rule
- Bond indentures
- Requirement of preferred shares
Copyright © 2013 CFA Institute 13
TAX SYSTEMS AND DIVIDEND POLICY
Consider a company that has earnings before tax of $100 million and pays all its earnings as dividends. The company’s tax rate is 35%, and individual shareholders have a marginal tax rate of 25%. In countries with a split-rate system, dividends are taxed at 28% at the corporate level.
Double Taxation
Earnings taxed at corporate level and dividends taxed at shareholder level
Effective tax on dividends =
51.25%
Dividend Imputation
Earnings taxed at corporate level and
tax credit at shareholder level
Effective tax on dividends = 25%
Split-Rate System
Earnings distributed are taxed at a lower rate than retained
earnings
Effective tax on dividends = 46%
Copyright © 2013 CFA Institute 14
4. PAYOUT POLICIES
• Stable dividend policy: Constant dividend with occasional dividend increases
- Increases may represent an adjustment to a target payout ratio.
- In theory (John Lintner’s), companies may adjust to the target using an adjustment factor that is less than or equal to 1.0:
- Common
• Constant dividend payout: Constant dividend payout ratio
- Uncommon
• Residual dividend payout: Pay out earnings remaining after capital expenditures
- Uncommon
Copyright © 2013 CFA Institute 15
EXAMPLE: PAYOUT POLICIES
Consider the financial information for Apple, Inc. (AAPL)
1. What are dividends for FY2011 and FY2012 if the company followed a stable dividend policy, with a target dividend payout of 10% and an adjustment factor of 0.3?
Fiscal Year Ending 9/29/2012 9/24/2011 9/25/2010
Net income (millions) $41,773 $25,922 $14,014
Fiscal Year Ending 9/29/2012 9/24/2011
Increase in earnings $15,851 $11,900
Multiply by target 0.10 0.10
Multiply by adjustment factor 0.30 0.30
Dividends $475.53 $357.24
Copyright © 2013 CFA Institute 16
EXAMPLE: PAYOUT POLICIES
2. What are dividends for FY2011 and FY2012 if the company followed a constant dividend payout at 6%?
3. What are dividends for FY2011 and FY2012 if the company followed the residual payout policy?
Fiscal Year Ending 9/29/2012 9/24/2011
Net income (millions) $41,773 $25,922
Less: capital expenditures 9,402 7,452
Dividends $32,371 $18,470
Fiscal Year Ending 9/29/2012 9/24/2011
Net income (millions) $41,773 $25,922
Multiply by 6% 0.06 0.06
Dividends $2,506 $1,555.32
Copyright © 2013 CFA Institute 17
CASH DIVIDENDS VS. REPURCHASING STOCK
• Reasons for preferring repurchasing stock over paying a cash dividend
- Potential tax advantages
- Signaling
- Managerial flexibility
- Offset dilution from executive stock options
- Increase financial leverage
• A stock repurchase may be a good alternative to an increase in cash dividends.
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GLOBAL TRENDS IN DIVIDEND PAYOUT
• Current:
- Large, profitable companies tend to have a stable payout policy.
- Smaller and/or less profitable companies tend to not be dividend paying.
• Trends:
- In developed companies, fewer companies pay cash dividends, but more companies are using stock repurchases.
- The dividend amounts and payouts have increased for dividend-paying companies, but the proportion of dividend-paying companies has declined.
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DIVIDEND COVERAGE RATIOS
Dividend coverage ratios:
A company has $200 million in earnings, pays $40 million in dividends, has cash flow from operations of $180 million, and had capital expenditures of $60 million. The company spent $10 million for share repurchases.
Therefore:
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5. ANALYSIS OF DIVIDEND SAFETY
• We can evaluate the “safety” of the dividend by examining the company’s ability to meet its dividends.
- “Safety” pertains to the ability of the company to continue to pay the dividend or maintain a growth pattern.
- Possible ratios: Dividend coverage and free cash flow coverage
- Using dividends plus repurchases may be more appropriate for some firms.
- Values greater than 1.0 indicate ability to meet the dividend and repurchase, although the greater the coverage, the greater the liquidity and ability to pay.
• It is sometimes difficult to predict changes in dividend because of “surprises,” such as the financial crisis.
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6. SUMMARY
• There are three general theories on investor preference for dividends: Dividend policy is irrelevant, the bird-in-hand argument, and the tax explanation.
• An argument for dividend irrelevance given perfect markets is that the corporate dividend policy is irrelevant because shareholders can create their preferred cash flow streams by selling any company’s shares.
• The clientele effect suggests that different classes of investors have differing preferences for dividend income.
• Dividend declarations may provide information to investors regarding the prospects of the company.
• The payment of dividends can help reduce the agency conflicts between managers and shareholders, but can worsen conflicts of interest between shareholders and debtholders.
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SUMMARY (CONTINUED)
• Investment opportunities, the volatility expected in future earnings, financial flexibility, taxes, flotation costs, and contractual and legal restrictions affect dividend policies.
• Using a stable dividend policy, a company may attempt to align its dividend growth rate to the company’s long-term earnings growth rate.
• The stable dividend policy can be represented by a gradual adjustment process in which the expected dividend is equal to last year’s dividend per share, plus any adjustment.
• With a constant dividend payout ratio policy, a company applies a target dividend payout ratio to current earnings.
• In a residual dividend policy, the amount of the annual dividend is affected by both the earnings and the capital investment spending.
Copyright © 2013 CFA Institute 23
SUMMARY (CONTINUED)
• Share repurchases usually offer more flexibility than cash dividends by not establishing the expectation that a particular level of cash distribution will be maintained.
• Share repurchases can signal that company officials think their shares are undervalued. On the other hand, share repurchases could send a negative signal that the company has few positive NPV opportunities.
• The issue of dividend safety deals with the likelihood of the dividend being continued.
• Early warning signs of whether a company can sustain its dividend include the level of dividend yield, whether the company borrows to pay the dividend, and the company’s past dividend record.