Are dividends disappearing? Dividend concentration and the consolidation of earnings

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: DeAngelo, H; DeAngelo, L; Skinner, DJ
• 署名单位: University of Southern California; University of Michigan System; University of Michigan
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF FINANCIAL ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0304-405X
• DOI: 10.1016/S0304-405X(03)00186-7
• 发表日期: 2004
• 页码: 425-456
• 关键词: dividends; payout policy; earnings concentration; losses

摘要

Aggregate real dividends paid by industrial firms increased over the past two decades even though, as Fama and French (J. Financial Econ. 60, 3) (2001 a) document, the number of dividend payers decreased by over 50%. The reason is that (i) the reduction in payers occurs almost entirely among firms that paid very small dividends, and (ii) increased real dividends from the top payers swamp the modest dividend reduction from the loss of many small payers. These trends reflect high and increasing concentration in the supply of dividends which, in turn, reflects high and increasing earnings concentration. For example, the 25 firms that paid the largest dividends in 2000 account for a majority of the aggregate dividends and earnings of industrial firms. Industrial firms exhibit a two-tier structure in which a small number of firms with very high earnings collectively generates the majority of earnings and dominates the dividend supply, while the vast majority of firms has at best a modest collective impact on aggregate earnings and dividends. (C) 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.