Whether you're interested in outperforming the broad market or producing a passive income stream, dividend-paying stocks are what you want in your portfolio.

Nearly everyone knows that dividend payers deliver quarterly payouts, but that's not all they're good for. It's a well-documented fact that companies committed to distributing their profits usually outperform companies that don't have a dividend program.

During a 50-year period that ended in 2023, non-dividend-paying stocks in the benchmark S&P 500 index delivered a 4.27% average annual return. Over the same time frame, dividend payers in the same index delivered a 9.17% average annual return, or more than double that of their non-dividend-paying cousins, according to Hartford Funds and Ned Davis Research.

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Source Fool.com