Pfizer hikes its dividend

Article Excerpt

PFIZER INC. $36 (New York symbol PFE; Income Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 6.0 billion; Market cap: $216.0 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 4.1; Dividend yield: 3.8%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.pfizer.com) is one of the world’s leading prescription drugmakers. Its top-selling prescription brands include Lyrica (epilepsy), Celebrex (arthritis pain) and Enbrel (plaque psoriasis, rheumatoid arthritis). Pfizer plans to either sell or spin off its over-the-counter drug businesses in 2018. Starting with the March 2018 payment, the company will increase its quarterly dividend by 6.3%, to $0.34 a share from $0.32. The new annual rate of $1.36 yields 3.8%. Pfizer has now increased the annual rate each year since 2011. The company also announced a new $10 billion share repurchase authorization. If you include $6.4 billion remaining under the previous plan, Pfizer can now buy back up to $16.4 billion, or about 8%, of its shares. There are no time limits for those purchases. Pfizer is a buy. buy…