12 Best International Dividend Stocks to Buy Now

4. Canadian Natural Resources Ltd (NYSE:CNQ)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 45

Canadian Natural Resources Ltd (NYSE:CNQ) is a Canadian oil and natural gas company. It currently offers a quarterly dividend of C$1.05 ($0.76) per share and its stock sports a yield of around 2.2%. It is one of the best dividend stocks on our list as the company has been growing its dividends for the past 25 consecutive years.

With a market cap of $76 billion, Canadian Natural Resources Ltd (NYSE:CNQ) is one of the largest companies in Canada. The company has a diversified portfolio of assets, a big part of which provide long-life and low-decline production of oil. The company estimates that 73% of its total liquid production came from these assets last year. Moreover, the company has been expanding its reserves and production capacity. With a break-even estimated at around $30 per barrel, Canadian Natural Resources Ltd (NYSE:CNQ) is well-positioned to generate substantial cash flow even in the current environment and can weather a potential drop in price that might be caused by a recession.

In the meantime, Canadian Natural Resources Ltd (NYSE:CNQ), besides rewarding its shareholders with a solid dividend, has been working on strengthening its balance sheet. The company ended the first quarter with $11.04 billion in debt, which was slightly higher than the $10.8 billion figure, but lower than $14.69 billion it had at the end of 2021. The company also grew its cash position to $1.40 billion at the end of March from $1.05 billion at the end of 2021. At the same time, Canadian Natural Resources ended March with just $1.82 billion in free cash flow, which was a substantial decline from $3.84 billion a quarter earlier. However, this decline is attributed to the company’s commitment to return all of its free cash flow to shareholders through dividend payments and stock buybacks.

Earlier this month, Canadian Natural Resources (NYSE:CNQ) conducted a two-for-one stock split, which should allow more investors to take advantage of the company’s growth prospects and enjoy stable dividend payouts. The split comes as the stock has enjoyed more than 400% appreciation since 2020.

According to Insider Monkey’s database, 45 hedge funds owned stakes in Canadian Natural Resources Ltd (NYSE:CNQ) with a total value of $2.5 billion, up from 41 funds in the previous quarter. Among these funds, the top shareholders are Donald Yacktman’s Yacktman Asset Management and Rajiv Jain’s GQG Partners, which own 30.08 million shares, and 19.82 million shares, respectively.