HSL : 70% increase in dividend tops another good year for Henderson Smaller
Henderson Smaller Companies Trust beat its benchmark, the Numis Smaller Companies Index excluding investment companies, over the year that finished on 31 May 2014 – generating a total return on net assets of 19.9% vs. 19.1% for the index. Shareholders have done better than this (22.7%) as Henderson Smaller’s discount narrowed over the year.
The dividend for the year is 11p vs 6.5p in the previous year. The big jump in the dividend was enabled by writing off more of the company’s expenses against capital rather than income and by increases in dividends from investments.