The Irrelevance of Dividends

[@benmenk8982]

A lot of people misunderstanding what was said here... the takeaway: don’t just invest or stock pick based solely on the fact it’s a dividend payer. The end

[@BenFelixCSI]

Thank you for paying attention and not blindly yelling at me based on the title :)

[@kaseywoody4951]

True and he is also assuming you are planning on selling the stock at some point. Addition to that, he is not assuming you are planning to reinvest your dividends by purchasing additional shares. Therefore, in summary if you are planning on selling the stock at some point dividends are irrelevant. Personally, I love dividend stocks but I don't limit myself to just them. Meaning the dividends are irrelevant to me IF I PLAN TO SELL THE STOCK! Some shares such as utility companies I won't sell. Unless someone invents a way for us human beings to live without water.

[@CW-up7xv]

@@kaseywoody4951 actually whether or not you sell doesn't matter either. Did you listen to his argument?

[@kaseywoody4951]

@@CW-up7xv Yes I did and you absolutely have to sell to make a difference. You don't have anything until you sell. If you buy a share for $10 and it goes to a $400. Doesn't mean you have $400 until the transaction is completed and is sold to another buyer. However, if the stocked paid a dividend and you have been receiving dividend payments that cannot be taken away. They can stop or reduce it but they cannot go back and get back what they paid you. The dividend payout will reduce the money the company has and therefore (ceteris paribus) slow down the growth of company (because the retained earnings would be less) compared to company that doesn't payout the dividend again ceteris paribus. But until you sell your share you don't have the captured gain.

[@CW-up7xv]

@@kaseywoody4951 well if you reinvest the dividends, as most people do, then it wouldn't matter. That's true about cashing out on dividends, but ultimately, to recoup the money invested you'll have to sell at some point. That said, Ben never even mentioned research showing dividend investing actually being a sub-optimal way to invest. Check out Meb Faber's white papers on it: mebfaber.com/2017/01/09/high-dividend-stocks-worst/

[@SimplifiedFinanceSiFi]

Me: He's right Also me: Uhh nice 5% div

[@SimplifiedFinanceSiFi]

@Gemein Hardd where you gettin dat

[@Mosesusorer]

Simplified Crypto Probably out of his butt 😂

[@imunfathomable]

Also hes not right. He is nitpicking a specific type of dividend company. He doesnt understand the value of returns. Plenty of growth stocks that will flounder and do nothing while dividend payers not only share equity but it even attracts investors and increases demand.

[@BleuSkiddew]

@@imunfathomable he's basically making a case for ETFs with little or no dividends, so when one or two growth companies fail or fall inside the ETF, it the rest of the companies should be able to absorb the losses.

[@dxuhuang]

@@imunfathomable "Attracting investors and increasing demand" does not prevent dividend payers from "floundering and doing nothing" themselves.

[@zaynhaque]

Forget the peer reviewed academic research and robust empirical evidence, let's hear that skincare routine.

[@CC-jy4gr]

word up

[@elliottmiller3282]

Right though

[@listonrice5230]

😂🤣

[@TawdryTempest]

lol

[@MaxxerG]

Botox

[@CanaldoHolder]

In Brazil, dividends are not taxed, yet. But here we have SERIOUS problems to invest in ETFs: ETFs do NOT pay dividends and we have to pay tax over capital gains (15%) (and the dividends will be indirectly taxed when we sell the ETF, as part of the return came from dividends). Besides that, our index is super concentraded in some companies, and most companies in the index are commodities (oil, gas, etc). 1/3 of iBovespa is Commoditie, 1/3 Financials and 1/3 others.

[@BenFelixCSI]

I have heard this about Brazil. Very different environment.

[@DhenerAbade]

Grande Fábio

[@Netunium]

meu herói

[@samarkito]

Didn't expect to see you here, haha. At the start of the video, when Ben talks about low cost index funds, I thought the exact same things you said here. Not a surprise, since I've been learning A LOT with your videos through the last year and half. Thanks for sharing your knowledge. Bora Fábio!

[@subhabratade8847]

Dividends are taxed but there 2 scenarios. In some countries (like it was in India sometime back), companies pay dividends after paying their taxes. Then the share holders are not taxed for dividends (also also Dividend Distribution Tax (DDT)). Likewise in some other countries companies pay dividends before they pay the taxes. Then the individual has to pay tax on their dividend earnings based on the prevalent tax regulations. In general countries where corporate tax rates are kept lower, government taxes the individuals on their dividend earnings and vice-versa.

[@MENDLER1]

Ben is an honest financial advisor. A rare find in this industry.

[@CharlesPanigeo]

Summary: The fact that a stock pays a dividend does not give you any more information about a stock that cannot be explained by known factors ie (value, investment, beta, size, profitability).

[@matthewlandolt5968]

As someone who is relatively new to investing, I thought this was actually a fairly neutral viewpoint. He never implies to steer clear of dividends, only that we shouldnt prioritize for dividend bearing stocks specifically for that reason. Seems like sound advice.

[@mokahless]

This is only true if you watched the entire video. He's being misleading for the first half and using a title that can be interpreted in two different ways. Most people have a low attention span. The result: People who think that dividend investing is an entirely bad idea end up linking this video. The confirmation bias allows them to overlook the real point mostly made in the second half of the video.

[@TheMarcopix]

@@mokahless Yeah...I was shunted over by the Boglehead crowd on Reddit who are huge fans of this philosophy. For them it's only one way...

[@GetYoJonesOn]

Ben: “money can’t be created out of thin air” The Fed: “hold my beer”

[@nielguaman9412]

My thought exactly

[@Rideeon]

HA yep now watch us all pay for that magic money.

[@marine5546]

Also, the market is definitely irreparably broken

[@HabibiGib]

This concept makes me doubt the entire interest system.

[@frankmcconnel2730]

Well technically they did not. They added the total amount of cash, but the total value stays the same. It simply devalues other people cash.

[@Nierez]

His straight face while being so savage confuses me.

[@mackerel2002]

Yes, i like his straight talking simple style

[@vincentslusser9205]

Lol

[@listonrice5230]

Canadian. Channeling the savage power of the Goose

[@shaneb1861]

It’s the Canadian way. Hahaha

[@Commando303X]

The countenance of a serial killer...

[@timelston4260]

I had just created an M1Finance dividend portfolio when I first watched this. I had signed up for a trial of SimplySafe dividend filtering and chosen about 30 of the safest dividend payers, across most asset classes. But what you said here made perfect sense, and I liquidated those dividend stocks and turned my M1Finance portfolio into a diversification of domestic and international total stock market, large cap value, and small cap value index funds. Sure is nice not to have to worry about keeping an eye on individual stocks now.

[@deepeshchetwani6250]

Top 100 dividend paying stocks outperform the market in the long run. U need a dividend portfolio becuz dividend matter 😀

[@michaelswami]

Pick a strategy and stick to it. Whatever it may be. One video talked you out of your initial approach? Good luck to you.

[@timelston4260]

@@michaelswami I sought confirmation after I watched this video and found that other financial experts I respect (e.g., Ramin Nakiska, Richard Coffin, Rob Berger) held the same view of dividend investing, and their arguments were reasonable and data based. The dividend portfolio I mentioned was less than a month old, after decades of simple index investing, and I already had a lot of misgivings about the stock picking aspect of it. If I recall correctly, I ditched technical chart analysis earlier in life after reading one book about index investing and I'm glad I didn't "stick to it". It became clear that dividend investing isn't a sound approach, so it would not have been wise to stick with that either. Sticking to a bad approach for the sake of sticking to an approach is not wise. Changing portfolios all the time isn't wise either, but that's not what I do. Evidence shows that index and factor total return investing is the best approach for someone like me. I'm glad I realized that before I was too far along the dividend stock picking path. Thanks for your well wishes. Same to you.

[@michaelswami]

@@timelston4260 well done.

[@napalm8030]

@@deepeshchetwani6250you are clearly not paying attention and do not know what you are talking about.

[@druiz012]

I am a dividend investor and I agree with what he is saying for the most part. But I do want the monthly cash. I don't want to sell my shares to get income and I want to give that income to my kids one day.

[@williambetzelberger6128]

Exactly. I'd love to receive the income from dividends and give the shares to my family

[@banana-dw3ez]

So you prefer to pass on more shares of cheaper companies than less shares but at a higher price. That makes no sense. You can invest just as quickly as you can divest non-dividend shares.

[@owenwalker1774]

Me too!

[@FidelCattto]

@@banana-dw3ez If the shares don't pay dividends I need to sell them to pay for my expenses in retirement and god forbid we have a recession that plunges the market 20% for a year in a 20+ year retirement that forces me to sell off a higher percentage of my portfolio for multiple years to keep up my standard of living

[@2B_or_not_2B]

FidelCatto Completely correct. Dividend investing eliminates the need to sell shares barring a company completely going under but that is the same for both scenarios. With dividend investing you have a set income no matter the economic climate.

[@Normanrs2004]

I appreciate this explanation and can't really argue against the main point since I'd still like to be able to use math. :) Having said that, I'm still an income investor for one simple reason: I'm living off my investment income and don't want to deal with the stress (and possible mistakes) of having to sell shares to get income. I would be too tempted to try timing the market and would quickly be in even more analysis paralysis than I already am in forming and maintaining the portfolio (and other decisions in life). Dividends are irrelevant as a distinct form of returns in compared to capital appreciation - I get it. This knowledge has helped me avoid yield-chasing and constantly view total returns as the main criteria of a worthwhile investment.

[@FruitloopLeviathan]

Gosh I like it when you show scientific articles. You're the only finance channel that actually shoes scientific proof.

[@PandionisDemosthenes]

Dividends are a consequence of a business, that doesn't tell you anything on whether it's a good or bad business... So yeah... Business first.

[@collin8962]

Learning about investing has taught me the greatest threat to fucking up my future is me. But man I get the pull of those dividend stocks. When my broad market ETFs payout their quarterly dividend it does feel like free money even though it's not.

[@PapaCharlie9]

I think you summed up both sides of the argument perfectly.

[@atown71]

do u not just re invest them lol

[@darthnatas953]

Companies you own exist to make a profit and pay it out to you. That is the whole point of business.

[@dkhawk12]

One important thing he fails to mention is the psychology behind dividend investing. The number 1 biggest reason people lose money in the stock market, is selling out during a recession. A dividend investing strategy changes the focus from capital gains to dividend income. During a crash while your capital gains may fall (as well as some dividends may be cut) you still have some money coming in which can alleviate the fear associated with a dropping portfolio. Regardless of which strategy you pick, time in the market is the most important thing, so choosing a strategy which most effectively manages fear for you, is worth infinitely more than deciding if strategy A has a 2% better annual return then strategy B. Yes, picking a stock solely based on yield or its dividends is a bad idea, but labelling dividends irrelevant is nonsense.

[@whateverrandomnumber]

I also wonder what happens when you burn through your portfolio in order to pay the bills, and you have less and less stocks to sell.

[@matt9060]

Just to add to Ben's point, "Warren Buffett loves dividends and so should you" This is an Appeal to authority logical fallacy. Just because a prominent figure likes something does not mean whatever they like is true or the best. Also, while Buffett might like dividends, his company, Berkshire Hathaway doesn't pay dividends... hmmm 🤔🤔. If you want Warrens real take on dividends this is it: Companies should only pay dividends when they have nothing better to do with their capital, or if they cannot achieve a better return using said capital.

[@michaeluray]

"A company's management should first examine reinvestment possibilities offered by its current business-projects to become more efficient, expand territorially, extend and improve product lines or to otherwise widen the economic moat separating the company from its competitors." - Warren Buffett I mean the best way is to keep the money within the company ONLY if the company is able to invest it for its further business expansions on a proper way, but if not, then to give it to the shareholders as dividends or via buybacks. This article explains pretty good what I think about dividend payments and stock buybacks. www.fool.com/investing/warren-buffett-and-dividend-stocks.aspx

[@ski999]

Berkshire Hathaway not paying dividends is irrelevant and doesn't add to this absurd take on investing. Matt's admiration for Ben clouds the fact that Ben loves companies that balance dividends with growth, and ignores the fact that this was clickbait. Index funds, huh?

[@CC-jy4gr]

I heard he bought suncor.

[@primemover1930]

An appeal to authority fallacy is when Angelina Jolie says to go to college and get a degree in gender studies. Getting investment advice from Warren Buffet isn't the same thing. Not a fallacy since he's an expert in the particular field

[@songhuchoe]

Ben wearing the chefs hat and now stirring the pot on dividend bois

[@mindsinmotion2825]

😁

[@robb0995]

I’d so marry Ben Felix if not for, you know, us both already being married and his liking girls. But otherwise, we’d just lie in bed and laugh at the bitcoiners, dividend bois, and gold hawks. 💜

[@mindsinmotion2825]

@@robb0995 oh my!

[@KeithLburns]

Not really. We dont invest tye same way with the same ideologies. For regular investors you must sell your shares actively to get money. For dividend investors we get a paycheck. Some paychecks can be less than others but every month know im getting paid. And I'll handle the taxes with that money also. But in an emergency I cam liquidate the funds and take my gains also. But when ive invested enough to get a 3k paycheck every month why sell my shares? And why not just live comfortably. I can also have dividends pay me 4k a month. And set 1k send directly to the irs and possibly get a return back. Simple and easy. I share my wealth with my family my government and I go out and buy things all without needed to sell a single share. I simply check up on my companies periodically and see if I need to remove my influemce from their business and place my assets elsewhere. For example AT&T id move to Coke because they're over leveraged and in bad debt. However, im buying BofA increased rates. JPm isnt high up because they are innovating and seem to not have gone far. So i leave them sitting and paying me. I get taxed less on my dividends than i would for selling my shares. And I rarely would ever sell my shares.

[@PumatSol]

Keith Burns This video is not refuting your idea at all. Your stance is that the convenience of dividends makes them a good fit for you. You have said nothing about choosing dividend stocks specifically because you think you’ll get higher returns over time, which is what this video is about. He didn’t say dividends were bad.

[@irfannadeem9664]

Index investing for life... After years of rebalancing individual stocks I learned my lesson.. Buy index, rebalance as per ur asset allocation and not listening to experts on tv has done me more good than picking stocks..

[@mikesmith2315]

Same 😃

[@lrac88510]

Schwab’s swegx rebalances the funds 4 U

[@irfannadeem9664]

@@lrac88510 I am from India brother.. We don't have it here.

[@Iheartlifting]

irfan nadeem I agree. But this dude has a video on why to avoid index funds as well, which I have yet to watch

[@BenFelixCSI]

@Jennings you should watch it. It’s not what you think.

[@SS-sy4uu]

Lol Ben is taking on the Dividend investor community head on. This will get interesting. 🍿

[@jbmop]

Here come the downvotes! I'm sending GlobeandMail commentators here.

[@skovecka]

it would be like a doctor talking to the homeopath. He would be strange arguing and at the end he would claim knowing it better than a pear reviewed studies... :-D

[@mindsinmotion2825]

I believe that what he is saying does make sense and mostly any theory can be proven wrong at some point.

[@conduit242]

@@skovecka Problem is, Ben didn't read *all* the peer-reviewed research. Numerous asymmetries have been found in ex-dividend-day price going back 50 years and there are strategies to exploit this.

[@skovecka]

@@conduit242 if you can find such paper post it here. it would interest me.

[@forestandseas9073]

Thanks for making it easier to understand Ben. As a new investor I was wondering why there seems to be such a big pull to dividend only investing, but to me all I saw was that it cuts out half of the market and disregards great growing (non dividend) businesses with excellent financial fundamentals.

[@BenFelixCSI]

Your intuition was correct.

[@rokyericksonroks]

Doesn’t it cut out lots of crappy, poorly managed companies? You know, the kind that continue to get bids on their shares simply because the ticker symbol belongs to the index. No matter how awful they are, it will take years before they are disposed of by falling out of said index. Cluttering up the equity space with noise until their competitors finally gobble up their undue market share.

[@irhumbled]

@@rokyericksonroks ehh sure but you do sometimes find the same thing: Boeing for example was borrowing to continue to pay out a dividend (a stupid move).

[@PapaCharlie9]

Me during video: Why is Ben so salty about dividend investing? Everything he's saying is common knowledge, surely? Then I read the comments section.

[@mindsinmotion2825]

Hehehe

[@SS-sy4uu]

These comments are classic!

[@mindsinmotion2825]

@@SS-sy4uu and expected when a person goes against dividend investing here on KZbin

[@2B_or_not_2B]

Title could have been phrased better. “Dividends are irrelevant when it comes to picking quality stocks”. Instead he goes with a title he knows will get clicks and responses. Albeit negative ones. Seems childish.

[@SS-sy4uu]

Tubi well adults tend to read or listen beyond the title

[@jimcetnar3130]

Purchasing stock without a dividend is kinda like purchasing land you don't use. It'll appreciate in value if you hold it long enough, but there are two issues here - 1) you won't see a return until you sell, and 2) you have a finite amount of land you can sell.

[@jeremiahmiller4640]

James Cetnar love the analogy sir

[@MeticsMedia]

You can also look at it this way: The company is using the money that they would pay you as a dividend to grow their company and revenue. The effect is almost the same as if you just reinvest your dividend in the same company. So to make a reference to your land example: the land is "used".

[@DanDelos]

That analogy doesn't really mean anything because you can buy an established value stock and sell off, say, 1-2% every quarter to emulate a dividend payment. The difference is, you don't actually need to do this if you don't need cash and the investment will grow faster than dividend counterparts.

[@jeremiahmiller4640]

Daniel Delos how do you know the stock will appreciate? Selling off stock in bear markets kill your portfolio

[@pran10000]

@@jeremiahmiller4640 Well that's true. However, the lack of diversification to non dividend paying companies significantly increase risk and still don't make it worth it. Also, companies may just cut dividends so that's always a risk.

[@pascoett]

Dad is a big fan of dividends. The reason for it is that he holds most stocks forever. He only sells if there is a big change in the companies’ ownership. If a company has a good dividend at one point, the investor sees that it actually cares about the shareholder, so it’s a mindset. Especially in the last decade with low interest, and our countries’ lenience on capital gains tax, he did really well. His education as a banker made him a humble but great type of investor since 50 years.

[@laurelrunlaurelrun]

Can dividend investing help protect against sequence of returns risk in retirement? I notice that the 'lows' of my dividend fund are less extreme during downturns. Assuming the average return of the fund is sufficient to meet a person's income needs in retirement, wouldn't this allow them to be more certain their nest-egg will last? In making retirement decisions, the top-end potential of a portfolio seems somewhat irrelevant and it's the risk of running out of money in the future that really determines when you can quit your job.

[@jasoncatt]

Here in New Zealand we don't pay tax on long term capital gains, so I'll always remain a growth investor. However, there's something comforting with dividends in retirement. I'll be on fixed income and will be spending around half my dividend income on living expenses, leaving the rest to compound. Dividends definitely have their place, if for no other reason than to help me sleep at night.

[@masterh9795]

Thank you for reaffirming my thinking, intermediate investor here and always wondered why anybody would use dividends as a investing stategy.

[@bluesky5587]

Well you miss out on free money

[@miri9600]

Your ability to explain facts in a condense way is extraordinary.

[@derrickmichael-simpleautom2488]

Great video Ben. At the end of the day if you are investing in individual stocks you are are a stock picker, whether they pay dividends or not, whether that is good or bad...and the only reason to be a stock picker is if you think you can outperform index funds.

[@BenFelixCSI]

Agreed on all accounts!

[@sideout1999]

If dividend chasers (not investors) knew how to measure performance, they would index invest too.

[@biotikmedia]

@@sideout1999 you assume the price of every stock reflects a market that trades said stock based on entirely rational fundamentals analysis?

[@rokyericksonroks]

Wouldn’t another reason be to avoid market volatility? To forsake some market gain in order to have a smoother ride?

[@pran10000]

@@sideout1999 Absolutely spot on

[@ianchissy]

I’ve always gotten the feeling from the dividend crowd that they believe they’ve stumbled on the sacred texts in some investing ruins, a secret sauce we that they alone can know about, and forget that their dividends are seen by all market participants on the planet- it’s not a secret get rich payment. The replies here are hilarious Ben, keep up the good work!

[@BenFelixCSI]

It is, in fact, the religion of financial salvation; the answer to all of our problems. Thanks!

[@pennellbd]

My issue with growth in share value without dividend is that you dilute your ownership as you sell off shares. While if you are paid dividends you may retain your same ownership or increase it.

[@razorrook218]

Right there, that's why they're relevant

[@SynThenergy]

Percentage of ownership doesn't matter to most people. they just care about money. Look at Ben's example of company A and company B, they both end up with equal value portfolios.

[@fredefocus]

@@SynThenergy Yea but you dont want to sell your growth shares in down market to get income.

[@rayzerot]

​@@fredefocusI don't think most dividend investors grasp the idea of diversification to reduce risk and volatility. You buy less volatile assets along with your stocks so you never have to sell stocks while the market is down. All the growth, way less risk. Easy

[@leonardols1]

I don't think you got the argument right. It is obvious that, in a given isolated moment, Company 1 (110+10) is equivalent to Company 2 (120). Its pure algebra. In the real world, however, there's no right answer: the only thing that matters is what both companies are going to do with investor's money (free cash flow). If ROIC is higher than cost of capital AND it is possible to reinvest ALL earnings at the same rate, Company 2 is doing better use of the money by not paying dividends; if it is not true, Company 1 is clearly a better choice, because it reinvests the only portion of free cash flow that can generate the adequate returns. Although it's true that the sole fact that a company pays dividends is, in itself, irrelevant, in both cases dividend payments are far from irrelevant. The thing is most real investment conditions are likely to favor Company 1 for the following reasons: 1) only companies that yield a huge amount of free cash flow can mantain a sustainable and growing dividends payment over the long run; 2) companies that yield consistent huge amount of free cash flow are more profitable than others; 3) a great portion of the free cash flow is generally not reinvestable at the same rate of return, which makes dividends (distribution of excess cash) a better option for the shareholder.

[@la.zanmal.]

If we're talking about investing for the long term and accumulating wealth, then the fair comparison involves reinvesting Company 1's dividend into more Company 1 stock anyway. :/

[@financehacks5069]

@@la.zanmal. That was what I was thinking and I don't know if in his case the mode of investing mattered but if its a Roth IRA and you buy a dividend stock then you don't even have to worry about the taxes paid on the dividend so that portion of the video wouldnt matter.

[@ecefrm]

There's also this white paper from Vanguard, creators of the VIG ETF: "An analysis of dividend-oriented equity strategies" personal.vanguard.com/pdf/ISGADOS.pdf "Compared with other equities, the performance of these strategies has been time-period dependent and largely explained by their exposure to a handful of equity factors: value and lower volatility for high-dividend-yielding equities and lower volatility and quality for dividend growth equities"

[@neillamas8929]

Summary: Whether a stock distribute dividends or not is irrelevant to the long-term profit for shareholders because what's distributed as dividends is not injected back into the business, thus reducing the future growth of the stock and, hence, its price. Critique: That would be true if the price of a stock were linearly proportional to its net worth but it's not (even assuming a theoretically efficient market), i.e. if the retained earnings aren't used efficiently towards the growth of the stock value, the dividend would have yielded a greater profit to the shareholder. An extreme case would be a company that has reached "maximal growth" the only way for shareholders to earn money from their shares would be to earn dividends (as the share price theoretically shouldn't increase so that reselling it wouldn't be profitable)

[@alankoslowski9473]

It's my understanding that's oft why companies pay dividends. When they don't have more productive use for profits.

[@SuperDaveno]

The only good point for dividend i have heard is from Peter Lynch, when business keep the money they tend to use it for diworsification.

[@dstevens518]

Ben is making so many friends...lol. Gotta love informed straight talk. "Nope, that's not what I'm here for..."...lol

[@cedrickerbidi4519]

In a previous video of yours, that I can no longer find, I had commented that I did not agree with you on that topic. It took me several years and a few investing mistakes to (finally) realize exactly how right you are on this ! Many books out there sound and look pretty convincing regarding dividends, some of them written by professional fund managers. Until you can check a few things from experience, and open your mind, it is very difficult to understand why this is a true fact. I have become a much better and more lucrative investor after I stopped chasing dividend growth stocks..... Keep up with the good work Ben !

[@Leoappeared]

Andrei Jikh has left the chat

[@pran10000]

Andrei also accepts the fact that technically dividends are irrelevant. He looks at things from a cash flow POV. Just behavioral finance things.. Suboptimal but works for him..

[@nickhubert3804]

In the end dividends are cash flow you can use without selling ownership. With just capital gains you have to sell ownership to profit. Also , “net worth” means nothing compared to annual and monthly cash flow.this argument holds no basis when applied to life (all theory) . Well presented though. Good job

[@kevoncox]

They can't seem to understand that stocks don't happen in a vacuum. He also didn't address reinvesting the dividend. Some people put it right back into the stock, others use it to purchase other stock. You can't tell me there is not value to that. I agree that one shouldn't just pick stocks simply for their dividend but this information is laughable.

[@BryanCheong]

First baiting the gold bugs, and now the dividend horde. You, sir, are a brave man indeed!

[@SS-sy4uu]

Its a Dividend Horde for real. They are still posting salty reply videos weeks later.

[@BenFelixCSI]

Im going to come back on this topic one more time. Then I’m done.

[@SS-sy4uu]

I have to admit, living off your dividends is an intoxicating story. But I cannot ignore logic. For me there are 2 things in this discussion that changed my mind about a dividend focused portfolio. Idiosyncratic risk (I had to research this) and mental accounting bias ( I also had to research this). Once these 2 terms were clear in my mind the dividend investment focused portfolio didn't make sense to me anymore. I still like my dividends, but I like them coming from my total market, small cap, value and profitability tilted portfolio.

[@x01509]

Just to provide a little external support and validation to Ben, here's a disclaimer that appears at the bottom of my workplace Fidelity retirement program website: "Remember that a dividend payment to fund shareholders reduces the share price of the fund."

[@HorathDrak]

The argument for dividends goes like this: Managers get the urge to spend money when the company has it. Spending that money on certain things might be in the interest of shareholders, but often it isn't (company jets, dumb aquisitions). A regularly payment of dividends to shareholders will make managers think twice about spending cashflows and/or cash reserves on vanity projects or dumb stuff, cause they know shareholders will be mad if they have to cut the dividend. That is why Buffett can ignore dividends: he is able to buy entire companies or at least a large enough stake to get board influence, i.e. the power to prevent manager vanity or to fire offending managers. Average investors are normally not able to do that, so a regularly payed dividend is a plus if making investment decisions.

[@investorgreats]

Ahhh... stupid managers that spend money on stupid stuff. I didn't know about this insight. Thanks for the heads up! :)

[@elliottmiller3282]

This is one model of how you can use dividends to explain returns. Unfortunately, while being conceptually easy to grasp, it doesn't have as much evidence to back it up vs the factors.

[@pwsiegel]

Here's a counter-narrative: it's a bear market and company X's main competitor company Y is distressed because one of their key suppliers went out of business. Company X considers buying Y for cheap and consolidating the market, but to fund the acquisition X would have to cut dividends so the idea is rejected. Y recovers and the opportunity is missed. That's the problem: if shareholders value dividends over increased stock price then dividends discourage all investments, good or bad. That could be a good thing if shareholders are systematically bad at punishing companies who make dumb or frivolous investments, but if you believe that then you should probably exploit the market inefficiency using the investment factor rather than focusing on dividends - otherwise you're leaving money on the table.

[@indexanleger-etfsfurfortge9494]

What you are talking about is the behavioral explanation for the investment factor the influence of which was covered in the video.

[@kevmitchify]

So you can either a) invest in a company whose management might buy dumb things, but pays a dividend, or b) invest in a company whose management you trust to make good decisions. Mmm, which should I choose.

[@spivvo]

I’ve spent 35 years working as a professional investor and am also a CFA charter holder so know a thing or two. I would never use the dividend as a gauge of future growth BUT if a company is unable to pay me a decent dividend then it is either ****ed or growing so rapidly that all earnings are being retained to fund further expansion. It is very easy to see which category a non-paying firm belongs to.

[@shughes871]

Warren Buffet disagrees, though he isn't a CFA charter holder.

[@vancouveride]

If I have a portfolio of 50 stocks and I want monthly income and I invest in growth stocks then I will have to do ~50 trades per month to collect my income and maintain the portfolio weights. At $10/trade this will be $6000 per year. Dividends on the other hand have no cost associated with receipt. Also there are drips which often provide shares at below market price in exchange for the the dividend payment.

[@PierSilver]

Ben would would say that you should not stock pick. If you didn't invest in indexes, you wouldn't need to make 50 transaction. So at this point you are using your own sub-optimal strategy to justify to yourself why you can't exit this sub-optimal strategy.

[@Fabian9006]

You could also sell only your overvalued shares and you then only need 4-12 transactions per year

[@DividendGuy]

Ben, I have a few questions. #1 You once told me that my portfolio return was an anecdote. My return as an individual proves nothing (compared to empiric studies). Fair point. However, you used a simple comparison of VIG vs a Fund (Dimensional) over a short period of time (~6 years). How this comparison isn't an anecdote? How does it fare with empirical studies? Funny enough, the fund beat the ETF on top of that (I thought this wasn't possible?). #2 Since you like academic studies so much, how can you ignore Ned Davis research? Even if you make the switch from geometric indices to arithmetic indices, Ned Davis shows dividend growers returning 12.89%, all dividend stocks 12.83%, and equal weight S&P 500 12.35%! (All beginning in 1973.) (source article from Meb Faber Dividend Growth Myth). It's not a big difference (+0.54%), but it is still better. Invest 10K at 6% for 46 years or invest 10K at 6.54% for 46 years and you get $38.4K more (+26%) in your pocket. I'll take the dividend grower option, why don't you? #3 At the end of your video you cite Buffett (which is clearly a stock picker and 15 of its 20 largest holdings are paying dividends) to prove your point. How the opinion of a stock picker (even if he's the world's best stock picker) proves your point that investors should not pick stocks? I thought an individual's performance was an anecdote. Why Buffett's matter, but not others? Thank you for taking the time to answer back. Cheers, Mike

[@ianchissy]

"How the opinion of a stock picker (even if he's the world's best stock picker) proves your point that investors should not pick stocks?" He was pointing out the irony that dividend aficionados frequently cite Buffet, but Buffet himself is not a dividend investor, not that you should invest like Buffet. The video's entire thesis is that dividend investing is illogical - that's just another example of illogical behavior.

[@DividendGuy]

@@ianchissy, Funny enough, Buffett isn't a ETF investor either and Ben keeps referring to him after clearly stating that anybody beating the market is just pure luck. Therefore, what we find in his investment letter should also be the produce of luck, right? You can't say that no investors can beat the market without luck and then, pick one (Buffett) and use his "wisdom" to prove your point. That doesn't make sense at all.

[@Klayhamn]

@@DividendGuy there is a reason everyone's referring to Buffet all the time and not some other genius investor: because it's so rare for an individual-stock-picker to succeed so much in the long term. Even if you exclude luck as an explanation for the rarity of "successful individual stock pickers", you're left with the explanation that it's simply too difficult to do correctly. and if people fail to do it as their JOB (active fund managers), what would make one think that they as a RETAIL investor could hope to do any better?

[@DividendGuy]

@@Klayhamn There are plenty of reasons why portfolio managers can't replicate individual retail investors' performance. But it seems that this is not reported by academic studies (since it's almost impossible to conduct such research). Most researches address fees and stop there. They forgot to consider the size of the fund. It's a lot easier for me to initiate a 5% (of my portfolio) position in Royal Bank vs a 5% of a $500M portfolio. Pro must meet their boss' expectation at the end of each quarter, I don't. I don't have to fear for my job, Pros do. When there is a panic on the market, I don't have to do anything. Pros need to save their job and do better than their peers. I've been tracking my returns publicly since 2012 and I must be the luckiest guy on earth. Funny enough, I'm sure there are tons of retail investors in the same positions. All you have to do is to have a solid investment plan and stick to it. Markets create inefficiencies all the time (if markets are efficient, please explain how banks lost 50% of their value in 2008 and recover it all in 2009, or explain what happened between September 2018 and April 2019). It's actually quite easy to beat the market. But some people just can't (or don't know how) and this is why they do index investing.

[@mikaelheroux6012]

@@PowerChannel88 #2 If he proves that dividend investing outperform the market overall, why he doesn't pick dividend ETFs in his portfolio to benefit from what he just found out? The DFA core equity (both Canadian and US) ETFs have greatly unperformed their benchmark for the past 1yr, 3yr, 5yr and 10 yr. It seems quite obvious that the DFA methodology has missed a point or two while doing their research to build their ETFs. How can you trail your benchmark by 1% to 2% annualized return over all these years? Just buy the XIU and SPY then.... why Dimensional Funds? #3 Buffett is not a reason to do anything (dividend, etf, market timing, anything!), I agree with you. Then, why citing them in multiple videos?

[@paulwilson6449]

I both don't disagree with what you said and am not dis swayed from Investing in dividend stocks.

[@JonathanGarneau]

I was wondering if you had any thoughts regarding Micheal Burry's recent comments that index funds were in a bubble comparable to CDO's in 2008

[@EnriqueGarcia-hu9ou]

Jonathan Garneau I would love to see a video discussing this

[@BenFelixCSI]

I will cover this in a video. I have had this question many times recently. I don't know why Michael Burry's opinion carries so much weight. He made the right call once and his story was told to the world. Does that give him credibility? I do not agree with his concerns. The main concerns, market integrity and liquidity, do not make sense. Passive funds make up a tiny fraction of trading volume which kills the price discovery argument. A Vanguard paper estimated that passive funds only make up about 5% of trading volume despite their large asset flows. Active funds are still doing the vast majority of trading. Similarly the vast majority of ETF trading occurs on the secondary market (ETF unit holds trading with each other) which kills the need for liquidity in the underlying securities. If literally everyone wanted to sell their ETF units at the same time it could be an issue, and even then if liquidity constraints pushed down the price of some securities it would create an arbitrage opportunity which would presumably be exploited relatively quickly to push prices back up. This paper debunks a lot of what Burry said: personal.vanguard.com/pdf/ISGBEL.pdf This comment from PWL research addresses the CDO comparison: www.pwlcapital.com/its-wrong-to-compare-etfs-with-cdos/ We talked about this briefly at the beginning of episode 62 of the Rational Reminder podcast rationalreminder.ca/podcast/62

[@precociousdeathdealer202]

Ben have you heard of Andre jikh a KZbin who is big proponent of dividend investing. What are your thoughts on him

[@BenFelixCSI]

Never heard of him.

[@tyeealpha]

@@BenFelixCSI If you can't understand why people are paying attention to someone who was popularized on mass media... I suspect you are not likely to understand that dividends have positive effects on both management and investor behavior. Particularly investor behavior. But maybe you do. I wonder if you understand that humans are not rational beings? I admire your attempt to make them more rational... but they are not and cannot be deterministic. That is a factor, no? I am sure you can show us research on the matter. Please do. I suspect human factors are going to have more impact on volatility, not less. Have you considered this?

[@mireally]

There is one significant advantage to dividend paying stocks - they help you avoid investment debacles like Enron. As a wise person once said, you can fake revenue, but you can't fake a dividend.

[@BenFelixCSI]

Nope. Dividend signalling can be faked. Firms can raise debt to pay a dividend. A dividend proves nothing.

[@mireally]

@@BenFelixCSI Actually it does Ben. You cannot sustain a dividend by raising debt or selling shares without the market taking notice of it. However, non-dividend paying stocks can fake earnings for a very, very long time as evidenced by Enron. Take it from someone whose been successfully investing for 50 years and who like you, also has an M.B.A. and who has been a Registered Investment Advisor that this is a truth that is easily proven and has been validate over a long time history.

[@mireally]

Also, you might want to watch the Joseph Carlson video regarding dividends. It's enlightening. kzbin.info/www/bejne/npywin5-l7GcaLM

[@moviesins9226]

I only invested in dividend stocks until now, thank you for explaining it so well! Thanks to the Reddit community for bringing me here.

[@TheMarcopix]

There is no one single strategy. You should be available to a variety of options and strategies...a hybrid solution.

[@LeonardWaks]

This video neglects the main reason for preferring consistent dividend payers. It is not that they generate consistently better returns, but that "dividends don't lie." That is, while accountants can manipulate other factors, they cannot manipulate dividends paid out. So these are a rock solid factor when viewing a company as a company and not just a string of numbers. Also, dividends are "sticky," which means that firms are very reluctant to suffer the reputational damage of cutting a dividend. Whike this sometimes causes a company to over-extend itself, following the changes in the payout ratio can protect the investor from surprises. Most dividend investors are not trying to beat or even meet the indexes. They are trying to generate a fair return with greater reliability. A long term consistency in dividend growth may not lead to unmatchable returns, but greater security. IN Hulbert's evaluation of stock newsletters, the Weiss IQT - the Mother and Father of dividend growth investing - is consistently near the top. Using it, one case easily build a long term portfolio of very consistent stocks with relatively low Betas, at historically decent buy prices. That is precisely what dividend stock buyers want. Going one step further, while for US investors index funds are a good deal because of preferential tax rates for qualified dividends and long term cap gains, US citizens living abroad have to be very cautious about the tax policies where they live. In countries that tax global dividends at high ordinary income rates, they have to REDUCE their dividends. They can still get some benefit of dividend growth investing by buying firms with very low dividends, as generally their unrealized cap gains will not be taxed. So they get the security - and the growth - of companies like WMT and MSFT without generating high dividends.

[@christianolsen7834]

Great video, I agree with everything you said, but I do have a comment regarding "real-life trading" so to speak. Math aside. Do you think dividends can have a stabilizing effect on the price, as people are more likely to hold on to a dividend stock, with the expectation of getting paid in the future? People also like to reinvest the dividend putting buying pressure on the stock, pushing the price up. So even if the value of the company goes down with the paid dividend, as the company now got less money (Until the dividend is reinvested) the company might maintain or gain a higher valuation in other words, in reality, a strong dividend might mean that the market overvalues the company? In other words, when the market goes down, people might sell a stock that relies on capital gain, and hold on to a stock which gains a realized most trough a dividend?

[@rokyericksonroks]

Good points. Also, Ben asserts that being in control of when to take cap gains is of value compared to receiving dividends on some (quarterly?) schedule. Why isn’t control of your capital (it is yours even if Buffett believes he can invest it better than BRK shareholders can) important in as much as you may need to deploy it in ways other than a reinvestment? It requires deeper analysis, but I like the dividend because it rewards accountability from managers who know they must be accountable. True, they can demand the CFO produce a dividend by shady means, but not for long.

[@anarsucced]

Thanks for this important message on dividend, a lot people think that dividend stocks create more value for investors but the things are much more complexe that just pick stock who pays high dividend yield

[@negativegains4883]

Literally you clarified this entire thing by 1:10. I would like to see a 10 episode series where you keep addressing this topic lol

[@Commando303X]

The majority of Ben Felix's videos are shadows of one another - so, if you like what he has to say, you have plenty of opportunities to hear him say it again.

[@rakikibello3357]

Rationally Ben's arguments make complete sense and should be followed by most investors. In our family's portfolio, we have heavily tilted to low volatility ETF dividend strategies, for the psychological reason that we need 4.25% returns before inflation (gross returns) to meet our goals. The portfolio generates about 4.6% in income, which means that we are comfortable not having to sell units at any time. We completely understand that it may be suboptimal for total returns. We completely agree the tax efficiency isn't great. We also use the dividends to cover interest and capital on a fairly substantial margin loan and we wouldn't want to sell shares as we go or use our other income sources to cover that loan. In our case, it is a matter of choosing investments with lower beta and income to cushion the downside somewhat. There is no miracle source of gains.

[@Waddle584]

One of my favorite channels...always sheds light on complex subjects for me. Thanks Ben!

[@BenFelixCSI]

Thanks!

[@KatieAdler]

This is great! Thank you for this. I like the ideas that "they are an important component of returns" & "the idea of using dividends to pick winning stocks is egregious!"

[@pran10000]

Great video. Only one question - How would you address the problem of 'running out of shares to sell' in a prolonged bear market vs the company keeps giving a dividend and the stock price falls to near zero. However, if and when there is a recovery in stock prices; in the first case - you have no shares left! Whereas in the 2nd case your previously worthless shares pick up and now have some value again!

[@rayzerot]

If you're relying on stocks for income then you would be an idiot if you didn't diversify into less volatile assets to weather market recessions. Aka, down markets won't bother if you you're properly diversified

[@MakingofaMillionaire]

Oh boy. Can’t wait for the comments on this video (which was great as always).

[@mindsinmotion2825]

😂

[@Mosesusorer]

As you’d expect most people are dumber than a rock unfortunately

[@ValdeSanus]

Ben, I would love to see the same tax analysis in Australia's case. We have franking, dividend imputation and franking credits are treated as a tax refund, not an offset. Retirees that pay no income tax receive a tax return equal to the company tax paid on the dividends they received (usually 30%!). Probably explains why our index returns >4% dividends (>6% gross of tax) and companies have >90% payout ratios.

[@asterisk911]

PIcking dividend growth stocks and picking index funds are, of course, not mutually exclusive. For example, Vanguard's VIG ETF is simultaneously a play specifically on dividend growth stocks, AND is an index fund (i.e., it tracks the NASDAQ US Dividend Achievers Select index). The question of whether people should be picking individual stocks instead of an index is a different question from whether we should be choosing dividend growth stocks. (I'm arguing with you from the perspective of someone who broadly agrees with you and, in any case, deeply admires your work).

[@msills255347]

Hi. I'm a new subscriber. Just watched with interest this video. Is there not an argument to be made for the retiree to shoot for a dividend based portfolio to reduce volatility?

[@afridgetoofar1818]

So stick with the the Total Stock Market. Got it!

[@jcayzac]

This is the best investing video I have *ever* watched. The way to explain is so clear, so simple and accessible. You just made my day!

[@BenFelixCSI]

Wow. Thank you!

[@thudang5298]

Thanks for the share! Financial education is important - regardless of your "strategy."

[@PW060284]

share buybacks can create the same effect as dividends and does so more tax efficiently. buybacks are a more recent phenomenon though

[@doomtomb3]

The only weakness in the Dividend irrelevance theory that I haven't heard addressed is the assumption that the market is perfect and always acknowledges the amount paid out is equivalent to the amount changed on the balance sheet of the company. I believe the market is not perfect, therefore there is opportunity for undershoot or overshoot after these payout type of events. Disclosure: I am not a dividend investor but it is a strategy I have used before.

[@stoyan3597]

5:45 best burn I've heard from you 💣 Great video!

[@BenFelixCSI]

Thanks!

[@kylecostlow1]

@Ben Felix (or anyone I suppose) One question: (I tend to agree with you, but I have been considering starting a dividend focused portfolio as well) Lets say the market is down, you are retired and rely on your portfolio for living expenses: Scenario 1: Your dividend portfolio pays its dividends, and your living expenses are covered. Scenario 2: You sell enough of your portfolio to cover you living expenses. You say both are the exact same, but in scenario 1 you still have the same number of shares, while in scenario 2 you have sold shares during a down market. I would think scenario 1 would be preferable in this case?

[@BenFelixCSI]

No. In the no-dividend case you have less shares but the shares are worth more. Start with 100 shares worth $1 each for $100 total. If the shares pay a $0.10 dividend, you have 100 shares worth $0.90 each for a $90 portfolio. If you had not received a dividend and instead sold 10 shares to create a $10 cash flow you would have 90 shares worth $1 each for a $90 portfolio. If the portfolio rebounds 10% the gain is the same for both portfolios. You are indifferent to the number of shares that you own.

[@mikesmith2315]

It is important people understand dividends just one way to return value to shareholders. Buybacks and company using cash to reinvest are others. Tax treatment of each may differ based on your jurisdiction. Ben I think a good topic for future would be use of leverage eg leveraged ETFs.

[@BenFelixCSI]

Very true. Leveraged ETFs could be an interesting topic. I have a lot to cover before I get there, but I will add it to the list.

[@SoCal209]

Great viewer back and forth. Highly Socratic, which aids learning. Most of the comments did not degrade to ad hominem attacks. But good debate is always spirited. Another thumbs up video.

[@BenFelixCSI]

Thanks Sam. I agree this has been an overall good comment section.

[@graemerichardson8748]

What about the benefit of dividend stocks in a recession to bring about additional income in a tfsa? What if I don't want to reduce my units of the stocks and I just want the dividend to pay myself an income? Big 5 Canadian bank stocks have never reduced or cut their dividend. So if their is a recession it's possible that while the stock price may drop, I can still get a tax free payout through dividend. If I sell a stock after it's fell 50 percent don't I lose more during a recession then holding a stock and taking the dividend?(assuming they do not cut dividend)

[@JeffreyQProductions]

I understand your points. Can you comment on the argument that when a dividend pays out, the value of the share is decreased as you said, but then the share price is likely to rebound back to what it was before the payout? Is this real or no?

[@meowmeow58492]

On many ocassion i had. It rebound and even never really traded on ex date the same amount of dividends, i call it free money :)

[@iali00]

After being an indexer for 10 years, I’ve moved to building my own index fund with dividend paying blue chip stocks. So far, I like the results better because I don’t include a bunch of shitty companies that are in the index. If that means I’m a stock picker so be it.

[@learnsomethingneweveryday1539]

Interesting. I am thinking of doing the same after seeing my private pension be diversified into some shit I don't even believe will do well in next 5 years (Brexit)

[@fahrradflucht8419]

In this Video kzbin.info/www/bejne/rpfHfnd9fqZ1m80, Ben addresses pretty well, why your "own index" will probably underperform the index in the long run.

[@joelw2023]

Receiving yields from shares isnt as important as receiving expense ratios from investors.

[@DanDelos]

​@@fahrradflucht8419 he's just talking about there being a small number of big winners which means it's never bad to be "over-diversified." So assuming you picked random stocks in an index, in the short run you'll end up behind the index since there are a lot of minor losers and only a small number of big winners. But in the long run it will end up about the same plus you don't pay the expense ratio. And some people actually can pick better than a random sample from an index. So even if they end up behind in the short term, in the long-term the volatility averages out and they will get disportionately more big wins than an index.

[@pioneer7777777]

I've been doing this for the last 5 years, which is my entire investing "career" so far. Things have been going along smoothly and I am close to hitting $3k per year of dividends and have re-invested nearly $9k of dividends so far. It is a snowball that keeps gaining momentum as long as you can keep putting funds in along with the dividends.

[@Chris-jt1vy]

After some reflection I now completely agree that dividends are irrelevant to a stocks future performance over time. I also agree that receiving a dividend to gain income is no different than selling some stocks to gain an income. So what explains why many people have had success dividend investing and why are people sold on this strategy? I would argue that successful dividend investors are not dividend investors, they are actually factor investors. In addition, the degree of success likely relates to what market the investor invests in. Not all markets are built equal. Successful dividend investors typically invest in companies that have a competitive advantage, predictable revenue and earnings growth, consistently high return on invested capital, positive cash flow and a good balance sheet. How can these factors relate to future performance? If you agree with the efficient market hypothesis a company will beat the market if it exceeds earning expectations. These factors guide investors to invest in companies that are more likely to meet or exceed earnings expectations and avoid companies that are likely to miss earnings expectations over time. In Canada, applying these factors forces you to avoid resource sector stocks that do not have consistent earnings because commodity prices are highly unpredictable and impacted by geopolitical events. Avoiding companies that do not meet earnings expectations over time can lead to outperformance. Applying these factors in the US market is very hard because the entire investment world closely watches the US market and there is a huge number of quality companies compared to Canada. How do you pick the winners? It is also likely that a portfolio of Canadian stocks that consistently beats the TSX does not beat the S&P 500 over time. This raises the question of asset allocation. Personally I use factors to invest in individual companies for my Canadian portfolio. They all pay a dividend with a long growth history. I avoid resource stocks and the portfolio has consistently beaten the TSX over the last 10 years. I invest in EFTs for US and international exposure. Yes, you can argue that my Canadian portfolio is not as diversified as an index fund, but I don’t own the poor quality companies that make up a large portion of the index. Until I watched this video I considered myself a dividend investor. It turns out that I am not.

[@andreaskristensen3903]

Hi Ben What do you think of Michael Burry's new prediction about Index Funds crashing the market? 🙂 Keep up the good work! 💪

[@fnordiumendures138]

Yeah, I saw that too.

[@1Klaou]

Was looking for that to comment. It would be interesting to get a reply.

[@saifakib8346]

i was wondering that too

[@rman15]

He and Cameron covered that in a recent Rational Reminder podcast. Essentially, they said this type of criticism wasn't new or news worthy and that Michael's comparison between CDOs and Index Funds is far fetched.

[@saifakib8346]

@@rman15 which one? i follow the rational reminder. maybe I missed it.

[@mfalasa]

I don't entirely understand the main concept here. Profit or earnings don't directly drive stock price up, only investor valuation and purchasing do that, right? So while X amount of earnings paid out to Y shares as dividends directly distributes earnings to investors, there is no similar mechanism for companies that don't pay dividends right? X earnings, for a non-dividend stock, only influence the stock price of that company in that investors value the stock more and theoretically drive the price higher, but certainly not at 100% at X/Y per share. Essentially you're relying on free-market forces to drive non-dividend stocks up in value after earnings are announced, correct? In the absence of stock buybacks or something like that.

[@alankoslowski9473]

The market always what determines returns, not dividends.

[@GiantAnteatersRkool]

There seems to always be a rapid drop in comment quality on your videos addressing dividends

[@BenFelixCSI]

Maybe that means the information is touching those who need it most?

[@la.zanmal.]

@@BenFelixCSI I think there was supposed to be a joke in there somewhere analogizing comment quality to share price and videos about dividends to, well, dividends.

[@towTruck42]

So the big difference in a dividend stock and a non-dividend stock is the dividend stock gives YOU the choice of where to re-invest (or not) some 2-5% of its earnings, and a non-dividend stock just reinvests in itself? And in terms of the total yield then you have to add the growth of the asset price to the dividend payout? Does that get ugly for making apples to apples comparisons?

[@IakonaWayne]

Lol, dividend investors annoy me. It's like the KZbinr s pushing real estate got tired and found something else to generate "cash flow"

[@luisrobles5906]

My plan is to live off dividends though. I don’t want to sell my shares. Rather I want to increase my shares. You have to take different people’s situations into account. Not everyone wants to sell shares. Some want to live on that income to either retire early or to supplement their income.

[@ironeagle22a]

Love how he always throws in empirically. Nice touch.

[@newbeginnings9457]

So, at the end of the day pick quality stocks with less dividend yields! Makes sense and the tax part is just amazing! Never knew this and now I do! Am now rethinking my investment strategy! Thanks

[@ripeforinvesting1663]

As both an index fund and dividend stock investor, I enjoyed the video. It's not difficult to find a dividend stock with poor total return so it makes sense whether something pays a dividend alone isn't best indicator of future returns.

[@bretthood1272]

I couldn't agree more with the argument to not pick stocks based on dividends, however, the only thing I don't quite understand from your perspective, is this: I own the 10000 shares of company A, and get the $1 dividend for a total of $10000 dollars, and I am left with 10000 shares. If you were to, as you say, "create your own dividend" you would need to sell off 833 shares to get the same $10000 dollars. Leaving you with only 9167 shares to sell the next year. I understand that this would work in a perfect world where stocks only went up and you would need to sell less and less shares each year, however, the possibility being forced to sell shares in a down period to create your income is a huge risk to take on. Where as, some of the big dividend paying companies with long track records could still provide dividend income regardless of share price. Your perspective also makes perfect sense for someone with a very long time horizon that would be reinvesting dividends anyways, however, people that rely on dividend cash flow, or people that want to diversify their investments with dividend income are two scenarios where I feel dividends can be superior to capital gains.

[@mr.mysterious7940]

Don't see the issue here. Apple paid a 0.77 dividend on 11/14 and sure, the stock went down 0.77, but since then has gone up almost $50. So what's the problem?

[@benjamingehrke2533]

Without the dividend payment the stock would have gone up $50.77, hence you are no better off with or without the dividend payment.

[@commander_hedgehog]

I "think", and this is purely from a novice perspective, that people confuse "pure financial value" with financial influence. For the mentioned companies, 1 and 2, in order to "use" the 10´000 dollars increased value, you could use the dividend in company 1. For company 2, you would have to sacrifice influence in the company equal to 10´000 dollars. So I would say that there is a distinct difference between selling stock for cash flow and using a paid dividend. However, from a purely financial standpoint there is no value difference. Please feel free to correct me if I´m wrong here @Ben Felix

[@venkataanwesh]

Never trust a guy who doesn't blink.

[@rogerbritus9378]

I thought I was the only one who noticed that.

[@tw8464]

The video is cut. He blends the cuts very well barely noticeable

[@SoffyHoffers]

I watched these dividend irrelevance videos a little out of order, but this one I appreciated the most and made the most sense. So far, I've invested primarily for dividends because I wanted them to basically be another paycheck, passive income, etc., just like you said in one of your dividend irrelevance videos. After paying taxes so heavily for the first time (only been at this for a few years), I can appreciate the argument that growth stocks are more tax efficient viscerally. Until I ran into your videos, I thought such a high tax was essentially the cost of doing business, but now you've convinced me: growth stocks actually do have value instead of the dividend lens I was looking through before. Thank you!

[@napalm8030]

Well “growth stocks” aren’t the right phrasing actually. In fact the opposite of growth stocks is what Ben recommends you tilt you portfolio towards, if your risk tolerance is appropriate for it, which are called “value stocks”. But this video is more saying that you shouldn’t care about if a company has dividends or not. If you needed income higher than the distributions from index investing, it’s more tax efficient to sell shares. If this makes sense to you.

[@miklovelka6797]

Great video as always. Our investment group just had a discussion about this a few days ago. People got upset when I said they were just stock pickers! I’ll be sharing this video to further poke the bear.

[@BenFelixCSI]

This is certainly a discussion that gets people upset.

[@mindsinmotion2825]

Oh no lol

[@mindsinmotion2825]

@@BenFelixCSI you see it a lot here on youtube

[@junfan11]

Because truth “facts” hurts that’s why..🤷🏼‍♂️

[@VonGeggry]

I don't understand though. how does the company paying me 1$ decrease the share value 1$? I'd rather have that 1$ then them pay it as bonuses or whatnot to their employees(as long as I'm not an employee). I understand that it's 1$ they could be investing into their future but that doesn't always increase the companies valuation, right? Or mean that they would invest it in their future.

[@MoEMoE-oo9gw]

As a dividend investor I can only thank you for this video, you are so right!

[@Bondanalloy]

the cognitive dissonance is gonna be huge lol

[@tylerk7577]

I like both dividends and non-dividend companies depending on the account it's in. As a Canadian, I prefer putting my eligible dividend paying stocks in a margin account but my growth stocks I pop in my TFSA. I get the best of both worlds this way and as far as I can tell it's a pretty tax efficient method of investing

[@daviddalton8545]

Another outstanding video, Ben. You've got me convinced. I was thinking of adding a dividend or quality ETF to my portfolio, but now I think that if I am going to add anything to my core holdings in broad-market indices, it should be to explore factors. I very much appreciated your paper on factor ETFs for Canadian investors.

[@UnknownChimera]

Thank you Ben, so many people are misunderstanding this and you explained very well how dividends is priced by the market. Congrats you didn’t even talk about the price futures S0exp(r-repo-div)dt :) you would have lost too many people. I am trader in an IB and all you are saying is making so much sense, you’re the only one KZbin, kudos !

[@UnknownChimera]

Also it’s interesting to see that when a company is announcing a lower dividends the stock will crash in intraday, which is counter intuitive with was said earlier (future price of the stock should actually go up). Look at HSBC stock today, losing 10% because they cut the div for this quarter. My takeaway on this is that the market is pricing a negative earning on hsbc, and the spot tanking is a consequence of this (not the div cut). Happy to heard your analysis on this.

[@dylangouldthorpe3166]

But once a company starts giving a dividend they will do everything they can to keep that dividend coming because if they cut the dividend or stop giving it altogether their stock will crash. Therefore a dividend stock would be safer than a stock without one because they have to run the business to keep that coming.

[@GlobusTheGreat]

Wait but all it takes to crash the stock is for the company to miss a dividend payment? Sounds like a huge risk that non-dividend payers aren't exposed to. I'm never picking a dividend stock again.

[@chaosumbreon8731]

@@GlobusTheGreat odd. disney suspended its dividend payment. yet its stock is soaring. as did a bunch of the consumer discretionary stocks. suspending the dividend didnt change the sentiment about the health of the company. hence the point of the whole video. dividends should not be the only factor when looking at a stock. that's it. not that dividends are inherently bad.

[@davidchen5661]

I think in theory, dividend doesn’t matter as there isn’t a causality with performance of a stock, however I think this is a correlation. Well established mature consistent profit generating business tend to pay dividends. Therefore, for new investors, picking a dividend paying stock have a higher chance of getting a stable return, while missing great potential business. For experienced investors, it’s a different story.

[@jeffheller4180]

Dividend investing: Puts cash in your pocket as a reward for ownership Growth investing: No return or seen rewards for ownership, until ownership is surrendered. One pays you, the other is a classic example of ‘wish in one hand and sh*t in the other and see which one fills up first.” You can keep wishing, I’ll keep my paychecks.

[@andrewrich8388]

Ya didn't understand the video.

[@cameronbrooks1141]

Hey ! Been watching a lot for investing channels. There is really a LOT of schools of thought on about everything. For example- the English really have a different world view of the entire system- that being said- I’ve really learned a LOT from your channel. A lot I didn’t know- Thanks

[@Carlos-kv6hx]

You are correct to an extent. Dividends are just a component of total return. While the bulk comes from capital gains, dividend payments do matter: 1) using that cash flow to buy under valued companies 2) DRIP over time 3) gives an investor peace of mind that even in a down market dividends usually increase.

[@naidnarnya9448]

Drip is actually a really bad reason to specifically invest in dividends (ie, if you’re buying something specifically for dividends that you want to drip, buy something else). The stock price drops by the amount of the dividend which you have to pay taxes on, so you’re ultimately in a worse spot if you’re dripping than if there were no dividend and your share price just grew normally.

[@bobburke5066]

I tend to be a dividend investor, although that is not the only way I invest. To me, dividends don't lie and if one can obtain a company with a long record of paying dividends when the dividend is well above the average payout, that's a good investment. Stock picking? Hmmm, I can see that, but dividends are not irrelevant. Using drip is good also. I very much liked the tax implications of dividends versus selling you pointed out. I knew the numbers and the math, but did not think of it that way. Well explained and nicely done.

[@BenFelixCSI]

Dividends are irrelevant in selecting an investment. Dividends can certainly lie. I think that the best example is the example from the video. You can have two stocks with identical expected returns regardless of differences in dividend policy. By limiting yourself to the payers you are missing out on lots of great companies that are just as good as dividend paying companies. I might call that being fooled by dividends. Similarly you could have two companies that are not very good in terms of expected returns, but one of those companies could have a high dividend. That does not make it a good investment. A long record of dividends tells you nothing about the future of a company. Thanks for watching and commenting!

[@bobburke5066]

@@BenFelixCSI Well , it's like any investment data point, one must look beyond dividends to make a good investment, but they are more than a great starting point and suggesting they lie goes beyond reasonable analysis. Still, very much like your videos and analysis.