📅 On This Day
A $35 Billion Ad Giant Is Announced, Then Unravels
On July 28, 2013, Publicis Groupe and Omnicom Group unveiled a $35 billion 'merger of equals' that promised to reshape the advertising world. Dual headquarters, shared leadership, and grand strategic logic made for a compelling press release — but culture clashes, tax complications, and a quiet war over who would actually hold power doomed it. By May 2014, the deal was dead, and both firms carried on independently as dividend payers, leaving behind one of M&A's most instructive cautionary tales.
Strategic logic and execution reality can be separated by an enormous, expensive gap.
FR
Source: Financial Times; Reuters
🌍 Around the World
South Africa's Dividend Tax Hiked Sharply, Catching Investors Off Guard
South Africa overhauled its dividend taxation in April 2012, scrapping the old corporate-level Secondary Tax on Companies and replacing it with a shareholder-level Dividend Withholding Tax — initially set at 15%. Then in 2017, with little warning, the government raised that rate to 20% to address a growing budget deficit, instantly trimming net yields for both local and foreign investors. It is a textbook illustration of 'regime risk': when a government needs revenue quickly, the dividend withholding rate is often the easiest lever to pull.
Treaty rates may offer relief, but South Africa's history reminds investors that tax rules can shift abruptly.
🇿🇦 ZA
Source: SARS Dividends Tax guidance; Allan Gray new dividend withholding tax analysis
🔥 Dividend Streak
Colgate-Palmolive Has Raised Its Dividend for 63 Consecutive Years
Founded in 1806, Colgate-Palmolive has paid uninterrupted dividends since 1895 — a run that stretches back through wars, recessions, and the birth of the modern economy. The company has now raised that dividend for 63 consecutive years, a streak that began in 1963. With more than 40% of global toothpaste sales flowing through one brand, the competitive moat here is about as wide as moats get.
A dividend history stretching to 1895 is a reminder that the best income stories are often the most boring ones.
CL — Colgate-Palmolive Company
Source: Sure Dividend — Dividend Aristocrats: CL
💡 Did You Know
Mortgage REITs Flash 15% Yields — and Often Quietly Erode Capital
Mortgage REITs borrow at short-term rates and invest in long-term mortgage-backed securities, with the interest-rate spread generating headline yields of 10–15%. The model is exquisitely sensitive to rate movements: a flattening yield curve compresses the spread, dividends get cut, and when rates spike — as they did in 2022 — the market value of mortgage portfolios can fall sharply, eroding book value. Most major mREITs have delivered negative total returns over long holding periods despite their towering yields, earning a firm place among the market's most consistent yield traps.
A double-digit yield can be a warning label as much as an invitation.
Source: Nareit mREIT sector data; Morningstar mREIT performance analysis