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WHAT ARE WE LOOKING FOR?

When a company pays a dividend, it's a sign of financial strength. When a company has been paying dividends for decades, and raising its dividend regularly, you've got something really special.

Today we're looking for U.S. companies with exceptionally long records of dividend payments and dividend increases. These companies have history on their side.

THE 'DIVIDEND ALL-STARS'

We'll use data provided by dividendinvestor.com, a subscription website where investors can track, sort and screen dividend stocks. (There's also a Canadian version at dividendinvestor.ca)

Bill Bouchard, founder of dividendinvestor.com, calls these consistent dividend growers "dividend all-stars."

"It's a sign of stability if a company's been able to increase its dividend for 10, 15 or 30 years in a row," he said. "A dividend increase shows that the board is confident in the company's future prospects."

THE SCREEN

We sorted the list of dividend all-stars based on the number of consecutive annual dividend increases. (A company was deemed to have made a dividend increase if the total dividend payments in a calendar year exceeded dividends in the prior year.)

We included the top 27 on our list. As you can see from the table, companies such as Procter & Gamble and Colgate-Palmolive have been paying dividends for more than a century, and many have been hiking dividends for 50 years or more.

Nothing is certain in investing, but we'd be surprised if this trend didn't continue. Remember, a growing dividend is great, but be sure to look at all aspects of a company before you invest.

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