📅 On This Day
Thatcher's 1983 Landslide Quietly Transforms Income Investing Forever
On June 9, 1983, Margaret Thatcher won a landslide re-election, earning the political capital to sell off British Telecom, British Gas, and British Airways to the public. To make those IPOs fly, her government mandated generous, high-yield dividend policies — and in doing so, invented an entirely new asset class. The ripple effects reshaped income investing across the UK and Europe for the next four decades.
Privatization didn't just change ownership — it handed a generation of ordinary savers their first dividend cheque.
🇬🇧 GB
Source: UK Parliament General Election Records (June 9, 1983); 'The Privatization of State-Owned Enterprises' by D. Parker (2004)
🌍 Around the World
Jamaica's Blue Chips Yield 8%-Plus, but Currency Risk Lurks
Jamaica's stock exchange is small yet produces genuine dividend payers — GraceKennedy and NCB Financial Group routinely yield above 8%. The reason is structural: historically high local interest rates force companies to offer fat dividends just to compete with government bonds for capital. Non-resident investors also face a 15% withholding tax (effective April 2025, reduced from prior rates of 25–33.5%) and steady Jamaican dollar depreciation that can quietly erase an entire year's yield.
A 15% WHT and a softening currency mean Jamaican yields deserve a closer look before you celebrate that 8%.
🇯🇲 JM
Source: PwC Jamaica withholding tax summary; Jamaica Stock Exchange
🔥 Dividend Streak
Canadian Utilities Holds a 52-Year Streak Behind a Modest Label
Canadian Utilities has raised its CAD-denominated dividend for 52 consecutive years as of 2024 — a feat that matches the elite US "Dividend King" threshold. Yet under S&P/TSX methodology, the company wears the same "Canadian Dividend Aristocrat" badge as any five-year increaser. Cross-border investors should read the fine print: a Canadian Aristocrat and a US Aristocrat are not remotely the same animal.
CU.TO's streak dates to 1972 — proof that the label matters far less than the actual history behind it.
CU
🇨🇦 CA
Source: Canadian Utilities Investor Relations; S&P Dow Jones Indices Canadian Aristocrats methodology
💡 Did You Know
An 1901 Court Ruling Defined the Preferred Stock Bargain Perfectly
A Maryland court in 1901 grappled with stock promising its holder "a perpetual dividend of six per centum per annum and no more" — and that compact phrase still captures the essential deal of preferred shares today. You get priority, reliability, and a fixed return; you surrender the upside if the company thrives spectacularly. Remarkably, the legal framework built around that bargain has not fundamentally changed since.
Priority in exchange for capped returns: four words from 1901 that still explain every preferred share issued today.
🇺🇸 US
Source: EBSCO; Maryland Court Records