A company that has raised its dividend every year for 25 years has survived recessions, rate cycles and technology shifts: this strategy measures that signal.
Save the strategy and StockScorer checks its rules for you every day. You'll get a heads-up whenever a stock crosses the upper or lower score threshold.
Once enough history is available, the backtest chart for this strategy will appear here.
Every stock runs through the same disclosed rules. The points add up to a score, traceable down to the individual rule.
Each rule checks a metric against a threshold, for example ROE above 15 %.
You decide how much each rule counts: from +1 to +3 or −1 to −3.
The sum is the score. Above the upper threshold: a high match with the profile.
These terms describe only the match with the criteria, not a recommendation to buy or sell.
Years of uninterrupted dividend increases: the single metric everything here revolves around.
Only strict increases count. A company that merely pays a constant dividend collects no points here.
A cut or suspension in the past year costs 3 points: the trust signal is broken.
Large caps need long streaks; for small caps five years already count: deliberately inverted thresholds.
For income investors with a very long horizon who put maximum reliability above maximum yield. If you also want coverage and valuation checked, combine this with its sister strategy Dividend Quality: 4 Factors.
Dividend Continuity asks a single question with maximum rigour: how many years in a row has the dividend been raised, not merely maintained? The principle is inspired by the well-known aristocrats and kings lists: a decades-long streak of raises is the ultimate evidence of pricing power, inelastic demand and management discipline (signalling theory). The point scale runs from +1 for five years to +4 for more than 50; a cut in the past year costs three points. A special feature: the thresholds are deliberately inverted by size class: a small cap cannot be expected to show a 25-year streak; there, five years already signal exceptional stability.
The point scale follows the streak of raises: more than 50 years of annual increases (+4), the terrain of the "dividend kings", 25 to 49 years (+3, the classic aristocrats standard), 10 to 24 years (+2), 5 to 9 years (+1). Below five years there are no points; a cut or suspension in the latest fiscal year costs 3 points.
The thresholds are inverted by size class: large caps reach the upper threshold from 3 points (i.e. at least a 10-year streak), mid caps from 2, small caps already from 1 point. The reason: a small company raising five years in a row already demonstrates enormous operational stability; a 25-year requirement would reduce the small-cap universe to zero.
≥ 50 years of annual raises: +4 (extreme resilience across several decades).
25–49 years: +3 (aristocrats standard). 10–24 years: +2. 5–9 years: +1.
1–4 years: 0 points, the streak is too young to serve as a signal.
Cut or suspension in the past year: −3.
The streak of raises is the hardest dividend signal, harder than yield or payout: it cannot be "improved" by a falling share price and cannot be built in a single good year. The limit: the strategy deliberately does NOT check whether the raises are earned: a company can artificially extend a streak through rising payout ratios. The coverage check is the job of the sister strategy Dividend Quality.
Calculation notes: calendar years with strictly increased total payouts are counted. The cut criterion uses last year's dividend growth and is neutralised in the backtest; the raise streak itself is reconstructed look-ahead-free from the payout history, a cut ends the streak there automatically anyway.
For income investors who want reliable, growing payouts as the foundation of their portfolio and are willing to forgo price fireworks for it.