Yahoo Finance Is Uniti Group Inc (NASDAQ:UNIT) the Best High-Dividend Penny Stock to Buy Now?
Dividend stocks like Visa Inc. (NYSE:V), Mastercard Incorporated (NYSE:MA), and Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) are gaining momentum following major technology companies announcing their first-ever dividends this year. Americans are also starting to prefer dividend equities during the current inflation storm and expectations of a higher-for-longer scenario. In this environment affordable stocks that pay high dividends are in the limelight.
We recently covered some of the best high-yield penny dividend stocks to buy according to hedge funds. Uniti Group Inc (NASDAQ:UNIT), a notable name in the REIT industry, is our topic in this list.
Uniti Group Inc (NASDAQ:UNIT)
Number of Hedge Fund Investors: 17
Arkansas-based REIT Uniti Group Inc (NASDAQ:UNIT) provides communications infrastructure, fiber and wireless solutions, owning about 140,000 fiber route miles and 8.5 million fiber strand miles in the US. It is one of the highest yielding dividend stocks popular among hedge funds, with a 15% yield.
Insider Monkey's proprietary database of 933 hedge funds shows that 17 funds had stakes in Uniti Group Inc (NASDAQ:UNIT) as of the end of 2023.
Paul Singer's Elliott Management, Thomas Lenox Kempner's Davidson Kempner, Howard Marks' Oaktree Capital Management and Ken Griffin's Citadel Investment Group are some of the top hedge fund shareholders of the company.
However, unlike Visa Inc. (NYSE:V), Mastercard Incorporated (NYSE:MA), and Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL), Uniti is a small company with low hedge fund sentiment.
Earlier this month, the company talked about its dividend policy and future expectations during its earnings call:
"Including the dividend we declared yesterday, we will have distributed dividends totaling $0.45 per share for the 2024 tax year, which is more than our current estimated minimum required distribution. As a result, and given that the new business will have substantial value accretive internal uses for our capital, we’ll be suspending our common dividend going forward.
However, we will consider reinstating a common dividend in the future as appropriate. Please turn to Slide 7. We believe that having an owned, scaled fiber network has material, competitive, and financial advantages. This is particularly true when you’re a first mover into Tier 2 and 3 markets by building and operating fiber with a true insurgent go-to-market approach. We’ve proven this consistently with our predictable mid-single-digit growth in our Uniti fiber and leasing businesses over the past few years. By combining our fully-owned 57,000 route mile Kinetic network with the Kinetic OpCo business targeting 4.3 million households, we’re now expanding the successful strategy into fiber-to-the-home. Importantly, we expect that the combined company’s current operating plan will be fully funded and that we will have the ability to expand the fiber-to-the-home build by up to 1 million additional households in our existing markets."
Is Uniti Group Inc (NASDAQ:UNIT) Really The Best High-Dividend Penny Stock?
Insider Monkey's research shows that Uniti Group is not the best high-dividend penny stock right now according to Insider Monkey’s research. Click to see 10 Best High-Dividend Penny Stocks Better Than Uniti Group. Disclosure: None.
