Dividends start flowing: $22 billion to be paid out

Cash payouts: Last week, dividends started flowing from those companies that reported early in the recent earnings (profit-reporting) season. Conservatively around $22 billion (or around 1.3 per cent of GDP) will be paid out by companies over the next few months.

Dividends in vogue: The majority of companies reporting half-year earnings results (88 per cent) chose to pay a dividend and almost 82 per cent of these companies lifted or maintained dividends.

Injection into the economy: Dividends totalling $17.4 billion will be paid out by listed companies to their shareholders in the three weeks beginning March 27.

http://www.commsec.com.au/reportingseason