Work-at-home trend will pad your portfolio

Article Excerpt

The coronavirus has highlighted the importance of big technology companies to the overall economy as employees shift to working from home. That trend will likely continue after the crisis as businesses gain from higher employee productivity and satisfaction. Here are two leading tech firms that are poised to profit from that trend, and reward you with higher dividends. MICROSOFT CORP. $147 is a buy. The company (Nasdaq symbol MSFT; High-Growth Dividend Payer Portfolio, Manufacturing & Industry sector; Shares outstanding: 7.6 billion; Market cap: $1.1 trillion; Dividend yield: 1.4%; Dividend Sustainability Rating: Highest; www.microsoft.com) is the world’s largest computer software company. Its Windows operating system powers about 80% of the world’s personal computers. Microsoft’s other main product—its Office suite, which includes a word processor (Word), spreadsheets (Excel) and slide presentations (PowerPoint)—controls over half of its market. With the December 2019 payment, Microsoft increased your quarterly dividend by 10.9%, from $0.46 to $0.51. The $2.04 annual rate yields a solid 1.4%. In addition, the board of directors authorized a..