The board of Liberty Energy Inc. (NYSE:LBRT) has announced that it will pay a dividend on the 20th of March, with investors receiving $0.08 per share. Based on this payment, the dividend yield will be 2.0%, which is fairly typical for the industry.

View our latest analysis for Liberty Energy

Liberty Energy's Projected Earnings Seem Likely To Cover Future Distributions

Solid dividend yields are great, but they only really help us if the payment is sustainable. Before making this announcement, Liberty Energy was easily earning enough to cover the dividend. This means that most of its earnings are being retained to grow the business.

Over the next year, EPS is forecast to expand by 16.7%. Assuming the dividend continues along recent trends, we think the payout ratio could be 15% by next year, which is in a pretty sustainable range.

Liberty Energy's Dividend Has Lacked Consistency

Looking back, Liberty Energy's dividend hasn't been particularly consistent. Due to this, we are a little bit cautious about the dividend consistency over a full economic cycle. Since 2018, the dividend has gone from $0.20 total annually to $0.32. This means that it has been growing its distributions at 6.9% per annum over that time. We have seen cuts in the past, so while the growth looks promising we would be a little bit cautious about its track record.

The Dividend Looks Likely To Grow

With a relatively unstable dividend, it's even more important to see if earnings per share is growing. Liberty Energy has impressed us by growing EPS at 29% per year over the past five years. Earnings have been growing rapidly, and with a low payout ratio we think that the company could turn out to be a great dividend stock.

We Really Like Liberty Energy's Dividend

In summary, it is good to see that the dividend is staying consistent, and we don't think there is any reason to suspect this might change over the medium term. Distributions are quite easily covered by earnings, which are also being converted to cash flows. All of these factors considered, we think this has solid potential as a dividend stock.

It's important to note that companies having a consistent dividend policy will generate greater investor confidence than those having an erratic one. At the same time, there are other factors our readers should be conscious of before pouring capital into a stock. For example, we've identified 3 warning signs for Liberty Energy (1 shouldn't be ignored!) that you should be aware of before investing. If you are a dividend investor, you might also want to look at our curated list of high yield dividend stocks.

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