DAVE CHAN
Tired of waiting for your quarterly dividends to come in? In a move aimed at yield-starved investors, Canada's biggest exchange-traded fund company will soon be shelling out cash more frequently.
BlackRock Asset Management Canada Ltd., which owns the iShares family of ETFs, announced Thursday that starting in July, 11 of its ETFs will begin paying distributions monthly instead of quarterly. The affected funds include seven fixed-income ETFs and four equity ETFs.
"Income generation is a high priority for Canadian investors, and we believe these changes will greatly simplify investing for Canadians who need regular income from their portfolios," Oliver McMahon, director of product management for iShares Canada, said in a statement.
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There are no other changes to the funds' investment objectives or strategies. Investors will receive a regular quarterly distribution on June 30 (with an ex-dividend date of June 25), and monthly distributions thereafter beginning on July 30.
Competitive factors may have also played a role in the decision, given that BlackRock's biggest rival, Claymore Investments, has several ETFs that pay monthly distributions.
Here are the iShares ETFs (with ticker symbol in brackets) moving to monthly distributions.
Fixed Income:
iShares DEX All Corporate Bond Index Fund
iShares DEX Short Term Bond Index Fund
iShares DEX Universe Bond Index Fund
iShares DEX All Government Bond Index Fund
iShares DEX Long Term Bond Index Fund
iShares U.S. IG Corporate Bond Index Fund CAD-Hedged
iShares U.S. High Yield Bond Index Fund CAD-Hedged
Equity:
iShares Dow Jones Canada Select Dividend Index Fund
iShares S&P/TSX Capped REIT Index Fund
iShares S&P/TSX Capped Financials Index Fund
iShares S&P/TSX Income Trust Index Fund
John Heinzl