Season 2 • Episode 9
Paid in Spices?! The $1.75 Trillion Secret to Getting Paid Just for Owning Stocks
A plain-English guide to dividends, dividend yield, dividend taxes, ETFs, reinvestment and what getting paid to own stocks actually means.
About This Episode
What if an investment could pay you without requiring you to sell it? Jennifer and Julie trace dividends from the Dutch East India Company, where investors could receive payouts in spices, to the modern stock market and the role dividends can play in a long-term portfolio.
In This Episode
- What dividends are and why companies choose to pay them
- How dividend history reaches back to the Dutch East India Company and payments in nutmeg and cloves
- What a steady or growing dividend may signal about a company
- Why a very high dividend yield can be a warning sign rather than a gift
- Why strong companies do not necessarily need to pay dividends
- How ETFs can provide diversified access to dividend-paying stocks
- Why reinvesting dividends can accelerate long-term growth
- How dividend investing can fit alongside growth investing
Cocktail of the Episode
The Dividend’s Tale
A riff on the Lion’s Tail, The Dividend’s Tale uses bourbon, apple-ginger shrub, fresh citrus, simple syrup and Angostura bitters. It is layered, steady and just unexpected enough to fit the episode.
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