30 Highest Yielding Dividend Challenger Growth Stocks

 | Feb 23, 2013 11:58PM ET

Dividend Challengers are the third class of the best dividend growth stocks. They raised cash distributions to shareholders in form of dividends over a period of between 5 and 10 years without a break.

In total, there are companies with a yield of more than 5 percent and nearly half of the results are recommended to buy.

Some Challengers have the potential to become Champions but most of them will fail over the next five or ten years. I personally would not use the dividend growth criteria as a big requirement. The biggest capital gains will be made with good growth picks.

AmeriGas Partners (APU) has a market capitalization of $3.95 billion. The company employs 8,660 people, generates revenue of $2.921 billion and has a net income of $12.67 million. The firm’s earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) amounts to $307.52 million. The EBITDA margin is 10.53 percent (the operating margin is 5.38 percent and the net profit margin 0.43 percent).

Financial Analysis: The total debt represents 52.64 percent of the company’s assets and the total debt in relation to the equity amounts to 166.40 percent. Due to the financial situation, a return on equity of -1.05 percent was realized. Twelve trailing months earnings per share reached a value of $1.01. Last fiscal year, the company paid $3.10 in the form of dividends to shareholders.

Market Valuation: Here are the price ratios of the company: The P/E ratio is 42.24, the P/S ratio is 1.35 and the P/B ratio is finally 2.80. The dividend yield amounts to 7.52 percent and the beta ratio has a value of 0.36.