WEC Energy to Reward the Shareholders With 6.7% Dividend Hike

WEC Energy Group WEC announced that the board of directors has approved a 6.7% increase in the quarterly dividend rate. The new quarterly dividend will be 95.25 cents, payable in the first quarter of 2026.

The company’s new annualized dividend rate is $3.81 and is in line with WEC's long-term goal to grow the dividend at an average of roughly 7-8% annually over the next five years.

WEC Energy’s current dividend yield is 3.58%, better than the Zacks S&P 500 Composite’s 1.08%.

Can WEC Energy Sustain Dividend Hikes?

WEC Energy has the potential to get sustainable long-term benefits due to improving demand from large and small commercial and industrial (C&I) customers, as well as from the residential space. Ongoing economic improvements in its service territories have also helped the company expand its customer base. 

WEC Energy plans to invest in cost-effective, zero-carbon generation sources like solar and wind. The company expects to invest $36.5 billion in the 2026-2030 period to further strengthen its existing operations.

This strategic investment will enhance and further strengthen its infrastructure, allowing it to efficiently meet the rising demand from large commercial and industrial customers and from the AI-based data centers.

These positive developments, along with contributions from its organic assets, will allow the company to have ample financial flexibility to provide and increase dividend rates.

Utilities Continue to Reward Shareholders

Domestic-focused, rate-regulated electric power utilities are stable performers, which allows them to reward shareholders through dividend hikes and share buybacks. Other utilities such as NextEra Energy NEE, Fortis Inc. FTS and Clearway Energy CWEN have raised dividend rates during 2025.

The current dividend yields of NEE, FTS and CWEN are 2.67%, 3.57% and 5.26%, respectively, which are higher than the S&P 500 Composite’s yield of 1.45%.

Price Movement

Over the past year, WEC Energy’s shares have risen 9.5% but lagged behind the industry’s growth of 18.6%.

Zacks Rank

WEC Energy currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

 

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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

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