dividend

And none of the 20 pays a dividend.

Both timber companies are structured as real-estate investment trusts, which don’t pay much corporate income tax and instead pass most of their profits on to shareholders as dividends.

But for most of the large U.S. banks, regulator-approved dividend increases have been the norm in recent years, along with share buybacks that lower the share counts and boost EPS.

Businesses for years overproduced and drilled themselves into bankruptcy; investors have since pressured them to rein in spending and return cash to shareholders via buybacks and dividends.

“The really big dividends, the really big stuff that comes from transformation, that just takes a while to work out how to do,” he said.