Dividend Rating: A measure of the stock's dividend growth history and uses
the average growth for 1, 3, 5 and 10 year periods. If the average growth
is positive for all 4 periods, Rating=A, if positive 3 out of 4 periods,
Rating=B, 2 out of 4=C, and so on.
Returns Rating: A measure of the stock's total return relative to the S&P
500 return for 1, 3, 5 and 10 year periods. If it outperformed the S&P for all 4
periods, Rating = A, if 3 out of 4 periods, Rating=B, and so on.
Annual Dividend Yield: This is the total dividends paid during the year as a percentage of the stock price. On this site, the yield calculation for a given year uses the stock price at the beginning of the year.
Annual Dividend Growth: This is the year-over-year growth in the dividend amount. For multi-year periods (eg. 3 year, 5 year) the percentage shown is the simple average of annual growth rates.
# Years of Dividend Growth: The number of years this stock had dividend growth out of the last so many years. For example, if this value is 4 in the “5 Year” column in the chart above, it indicates that the company’s dividends increased 4 out of the last 5 years.
Average Annual Stock Return: This is the compounded annual
return which includes all dividends plus stock price appreciation and is a more meaningful number than the dividend yield by itself. At the end of the day, it is the total return that really matters to the investor. A stock with a 15% dividend yield which lost 30% of its stock value for the year is not a great investment.
Annual Stock Volatility: This is how much the stock fluctuates during a 12-month period. The value shown is the annualized standard deviation of monthly price changes (calculated using adjusted closing price in Yahoo Finance). While the calculation itself is somewhat complicated, its explanation is not. In a nutshell, over a 1 year period approximately 2/3 of the time the stock price will be within one standard deviation of the 1 year average price. In general, the lower the volatility, the better.
Annual S&P Return and Volatility: These values are shown as reference points so that you can compare the stock’s performance relative to the broad market represented by the Standard & Poor 500 companies. They will help you see a stock’s return and volatility in proper perspective. Annual return of -15% may not sound so bad if you knew that for the same period, the S&P was down 18%.
Historical Data: All calculations are performed using Yahoo Finance adjusted
monthly closing price data. Please see the following link for a detailed
explanation of the data:
Yahoo Finance Historical Data Explanation.