Which of These 3 Dividend Stocks Is Best?

Investing in dividend stocks is an easy way for investors to pad their overall returns, and they can also help offset bad years -- as long as the businesses are strong and profitable, their dividends should remain safe. The three stocks listed below are good long-term investments even without their dividends, making them attractive dividend stocks to buy and hold.

Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) is still growing in interesting ways, but it's also a mature company that is past its high-growth years, which is why it can afford to pay a dividend. With a stock price of around $167, its quarterly payments of $0.51 only produce an annual dividend yield of about 1.2%, well shy of the 1.85% that investors can get from the average S&P 500 stock.

However, Microsoft's dividend has been rising. The company hiked its payouts by 11% in September, from $0.46 to $0.51. The company has maintained a strong rate of increase for the past decade, and dividend payments have nearly quadrupled from $0.13 in fiscal 2010.

Source Fool.com