3 dividend destroyers I’d buy in February

Pub operator Marston’s (LSE: MARS) has a great record of delivering sizeable dividend increases year after year. And the firm looks set to keep shelling out tasty payouts as thirsty punters flock through its doors.

Marston’s advised last week that “our performance in the financial year to date has been encouraging, including good trading over the Christmas and New Year period despite tough comparatives.”

The business saw like-for-like sales at its premium and destination pubs rise 1.5% during the 16 weeks to January 21, with underlying food and drink sales growing 0.6% and 1.4% from the previous year. And Marston’s is aggressively expanding to capitalise on bubbling demand, the firm eyeing 20 new pub-restaurants and bars and five lodges in the current fiscal year alone.

The City believes Marston’s has what it takes to defy any Brexit-related pressures on drinkers’ wallets, and with the ale ace expected to keep delivering solid earnings growth, anticipate dividends of 7.5p and 7.9p per share in the years to September 2017 and 2018 respectively. This is up from 7.3p in fiscal 2016.

As a result, Marston’s boasts bumper yields of 5.7% and 6% for these years.

Box clever

The latest trading statement from Tritax Big Box (LSE: BBOX) also gave shareholder confidence a shot in the arm last week.

The business advised that “with growing occupier demand and constrained occupational supply, strong rental growth has been evidenced during the last 18 months and is expected to continue through 2017.”

Tritax — which provides big box logistics to some of the world’s largest companies like Amazon and Tesco — is in prime position to capitalise on the lucrative e-commerce industry. The space supplier cited Collier figures suggesting that 18m sq ft of new logistics space is needed to keep pace with surging internet shopping activity, soaring above Savills’ estimate that some 3.5m sq ft is set to be built annually.

These figures underline the huge revenues opportunities at Tritax, and with it the real estate investment trust’s (or REIT) exceptional long-term dividend potential.

And on a more immediate time horizon, it’s anticipated to pay dividends of 6.4p per share in 2017 and 6.7p next year. These numbers yield 4.6% and 4.8% respectively.

Pay master

Payment systems giant PayPoint (LSE: PAY) also encouraged investors with its latest trading numbers last week.

Its huge investment to develop its retail services arm is clearly paying off handsomely, and transaction volumes here rose 11.7% during October-December. It was underpinned by parcel and credit card payment transactions leaping 20.1% and 11.9% respectively in the period.

And it expects the adoption of its Paypoint One terminal and launch of its EPOS stock management system — slated for release by June at the latest — to light a fire under revenues in the coming years.

In the meantime, City predictions of solid earnings growth expect to see the dividend at 47.2p per share in the year to March 2017, yielding a decent 4.9%. And PayPoint’s yield leaps to 5.3% in fiscal 2018 thanks to estimates of a 50.7p reward.