MW 10 of the most loved dividend stocks for 2026 - sporting yields of 4% or more

By Philip van Doorn

Many are energy stocks that have been crushed as the price of oil has declined - but analysts expect a tremendous rebound for the group

A screen of the S&P Composite 1500 index highlights a group of dividend stocks expected by analysts to soar in 2026, after most have declined significantly this year.

With the Federal Reserve having resumed cutting short-term interest rates, a 4% dividend yield for a stock is looking more attractive by the day when compared with bank or money-market fund yields. Depending on your investment objectives, the following dividend screen might highlight some opportunities.

There are many ways to select dividend stocks. You might focus on higher yields, or you might emphasize quality and value with a more modest floor for yields. John Buckingham, the editor of the Prudent Speculator, took the latter approach recently when sharing a list of 17 dividend-stock value picks with MarketWatch.

For this new dividend-stock screen, we focused on analyst sentiment. We began with the components of the S&P Composite 1500 index XX:SP1500, which is made up of the S&P 500 SPX, the S&P MidCap 400 MID and the S&P Small Cap 600 SML indexes.

We narrowed the list to 202 stocks with dividend yields of at least 4%. Then we cut the list to 176 companies covered by at least five analysts working for brokerages or research firms polled by LSEG. Of these, 57 have majority "buy" or equivalent ratings among the analysts.

We then looked at the remaining 57 companies to remove any that had cut their regular dividend payouts at any time over the past five years. This doesn't mean that all of the companies have existed in their current form during that period or that they have a five-year dividend history. Some have initiated payouts more recently.

Among the remaining 42 companies, here are the 10 with the most upside potential over the next year, based on analysts' consensus price targets:

   Company                           Dividend yield  Dec. 16 price  Consensus price target  Implied 12-month upside potential  2025 return through Dec. 16 
   SM Energy Co.                              4.38%         $18.27                  $34.17                                87%                       -51.4% 
   Upbound Group Inc.                         8.71%         $17.92                  $32.00                                79%                       -35.5% 
   $Safehold Inc(SAFE-W)$.                              5.20%         $13.62                  $20.10                                48%                       -23.9% 
   Iron Mountain Inc.                         4.27%         $81.00                 $116.40                                44%                       -20.2% 
   Northern Oil & Gas Inc.                    8.30%         $21.69                  $30.90                                42%                       -38.8% 
   Smurfit Westrock PLC                       4.57%         $37.69                  $53.24                                41%                       -27.2% 
   Kinetik Holdings Inc.                      9.20%         $33.92                  $46.55                                37%                       -35.9% 
   LKQ Corp.                                  4.01%         $29.92                  $40.96                                37%                       -15.8% 
   EOG Resources Inc.                         4.01%        $101.78                 $135.41                                33%                       -14.1% 
   Permian Resources Corp.                    4.29%         $14.00                  $18.57                                33%                         0.6% 
                                                                                                                            Sources: LSEG, company filings 

(You might need to scroll the table or flip your screen to landscape view to see all of the data.)

The right-most column includes this year's total returns, with dividends reinvested. Most of these stocks has been hit hard during 2025. Four of them (SM Energy (SM), Northern Oil & Gas $(NOG)$, EOG Resources $(EOG)$ and Permian Resources (PR)) are oil and/or natural-gas producers. Kinetik Holdings (KNTK) provides transportation and other services to oil and gas producers.

And this following chart explains why there has been so much pressure on energy stocks of late:

The front-month contract price for West Texas Intermediate crude oil on the New York Mercantile Exchange is 31% below its 2025 peak.

Oil prices (CL00) are in the doldrums - but U.S. oil producers over recent years have shown discipline, as they have been careful not to increase production as they had done before the long downcycle from mid-2014 through early 2016. With a cyclical commodity, one year's price decline will hammer stock prices, but might not affect dividend payouts.

The analysts expect all 10 stocks on the list to soar next year, and all of these stocks have good records for maintaining or increasing their dividends over the past five years.

But if you are considering any of these stocks for investment, you should do your own research to form your own opinion about how likely the companies are to maintain or increase their dividends from here, and how likely they are to remain competitive over the long term.

One way to begin your research is to click on the tickers.

Read: Tomi Kilgore's detailed guide to the information available on the MarketWatch quote page

Don't miss: Big Tech stocks are getting cheaper, and that could mean gains of up to 60%

-Philip van Doorn

This content was created by MarketWatch, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. MarketWatch is published independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

December 17, 2025 13:07 ET (18:07 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2025 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.