Cons

*Management and the board may believe that the money is best re-invested into the company: research and development, capital investment, expansion, etc. Proponents suggest that a management eager to return profits to shareholders may have run out of good ideas for the future of the company. Some studies have demonstrated that companies that pay dividends have higher earnings growth, however, suggesting that dividend payments may be evidence of confidence in earnings growth and sufficient profitability to fund future expansion.

*When dividends are paid, individual shareholders in many countries suffer from , in which the company buys back stock, thereby increasing the value of the stock left outstanding. In contrast, corporate shareholders often do not pay tax on dividends because the tax regime is designed to tax corporate income (as opposed to individual income) only once. The shareholder will pay a tax on capital gains (which is often taxed at a lower rate than ordinary income) only when the shareholder chooses to sell the stock. If a holder of the stock chooses to not participate in the buyback, the price of the holder's shares should rise, but the tax on these gains is delayed until the actual sale of the shares. Certain types of specialized investment companies (such as a REIT in the U.S.) allow the shareholder to partially or fully avoid double taxation of dividends.

*Shareholders in companies which pay little or no cash dividends can reap the benefit of the company's profits when they sell their shareholding, or when a company is wound down and all assets liquidated and distributed amongst shareholders. This, in effect, delegates the dividend policy from the board to the individual shareholder.

*Payment of a dividend can increase the borrowing requirement, or leverage, of a company.

Dividend > Cons

Cons