ARM Holdings plc (ADR) (ARMH), and Three FTSE 100 Shares Going Ex-Dividend Next Week

LONDON — Next week is quite a busy one for FTSE 100 ex-dividend dates, and it pays to plan ahead if you want to buy in time to be eligible for a firm’s payment — or if you’re hoping for a bargain price drop when the time has passed.

The FTSE 100’s current average dividend yield is around 3.1%, and we have three companies coming up next week that are well spread around that figure. The following three will go ex-dividend on Wednesday, April 17:

BAE (OTCBB:BAESY)
BAE Systems will go ex-dividend on Wednesday with respect to its final dividend of 11.7 pence per share, as announced on Feb. 21. Although underlying earnings per share fell a little, to 38.9 pence from the previous year’s 39.7 pence, the firm lifted its total payment by 4% to 19.5 pence per share and reiterated its policy of maintaining future dividends at a sustainable cover of around two times underlying earnings.

The total dividend of 19.5 pence per share represents a yield of 5% on the current share price of 385 pence, with the final payment alone providing 3%.

ARM
Wednesday is ex-dividend day for ARM Holdings plc (ADR) (NASDAQ:ARMH), too. The chip designer is not exactly known as a cash cow when it comes to dividends, but it did announce a 2.83 pence-per-share final dividend on Feb. 5 for an annual total of 4.5 pence. Even if that does only provide a yield of half a percent on today’s share price of 879 pence, it is up 29% on the previous year.

A further rise of around 15%, to about 5.2 pence per share, is currently forecast for the year to Dec. 2013.