Are You An Income Investor? Don’t Miss Out On Penns Woods Bancorp Inc (NASDAQ:PWOD)

Over the past 10 years Penns Woods Bancorp Inc (NASDAQ:PWOD) has been paying dividends to shareholders. The company is currently worth US$202m, and now yields roughly 4.5%. Does Penns Woods Bancorp tick all the boxes of a great dividend stock? Below, I’ll take you through my analysis.

View our latest analysis for Penns Woods Bancorp

5 checks you should use to assess a dividend stock

When assessing a stock as a potential addition to my dividend Portfolio, I look at these five areas:

• Is its annual yield among the top 25% of dividend-paying companies?

• Has its dividend been stable over the past (i.e. no missed payments or significant payout cuts)?

• Has dividend per share risen in the past couple of years?

• Is its earnings sufficient to payout dividend at the current rate?

• Will it have the ability to keep paying its dividends going forward?

NasdaqGS:PWOD Historical Dividend Yield December 6th 18

How does Penns Woods Bancorp fare?

The current trailing twelve-month payout ratio for the stock is 79%, which means that the dividend is covered by earnings. Furthermore, analysts have not forecasted a dividends per share for the future, which makes it hard to determine the yield shareholders should expect, and whether the current payout is sustainable, moving forward.

When assessing the forecast sustainability of a dividend it is also worth considering the cash flow of the business. Cash flow is important because companies with strong cash flow can usually sustain higher payout ratios.

If dividend is a key criteria in your investment consideration, then you need to make sure the dividend stock you’re eyeing out is reliable in its payments. PWOD has increased its DPS from $1.84 to $1.88 in the past 10 years. During this period it has not missed a payment, as one would expect for a company increasing its dividend. This is an impressive feat, which makes PWOD a true dividend rockstar.

Relative to peers, Penns Woods Bancorp has a yield of 4.5%, which is high for Banks stocks.

Next Steps:

Taking into account the dividend metrics, Penns Woods Bancorp ticks most of the boxes as a strong dividend investment, putting it in my list of top dividend payers. Given that this is purely a dividend analysis, I urge potential investors to try and get a good understanding of the underlying business and its fundamentals before deciding on an investment. There are three essential aspects you should look at:

1. Future Outlook: What are well-informed industry analysts predicting for PWOD’s future growth? Take a look at our free research report of analyst consensus for PWOD’s outlook.

2. Valuation: What is PWOD worth today? Even if the stock is a cash cow, it’s not worth an infinite price. The intrinsic value infographic in our free research report helps visualize whether PWOD is currently mispriced by the market.

3. Other Dividend Rockstars: Are there better dividend payers with stronger fundamentals out there? Check out our free list of these great stocks here.

To help readers see past the short term volatility of the financial market, we aim to bring you a long-term focused research analysis purely driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis does not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements.

The author is an independent contributor and at the time of publication had no position in the stocks mentioned. For errors that warrant correction please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com.