Mergent Announces Dividend Achievers Index Family Total Returns for 1Q 2006
New York, NY, April 11, 2006 – Mergent, Inc., a leading provider of business and financial information on publicly listed companies, today announced total returns for its Dividend Achievers™ Index Family for the three months ending March 31. The quarter saw Mergent’s Dividend Achievers advance on a number of fronts. The start of 2006 marked the annual reconstitutions of the Dividend Achiever™ Indices, in which all indices allowing an increase in the number of constituents recorded an increase. Most notably, the International Dividend Achievers™ increased from 42 companies to 60 companies, adding to the group a number of international blue-chips including Cadbury Schweppes Plc and Lloyds TSB Group.
Mergent also added to its Dividend Achievers™ Index Family during the quarter, with a collaboration with The NASDAQ Stock Market, Inc (NASDAQ®; NASDAQ: NDAQ) to use Mergent’s proprietary Dividend Achievers™ performance methodology and apply it to US companies listed only on the NASDAQ. The NASDAQ Dividend Achievers™ Index is calculated using a market capitalization weighting and disseminated on a total return basis (NASDAQ:DVQT).
“This has been a remarkable quarter for Mergent’s Dividend Achievers,” commented Jonathan Worrall, CEO of Mergent. “Our Index Family is going from strength to strength, and as our recent collaboration with NASDAQ demonstrates, we remain committed to providing investors with the best dividend-focused investment products in the marketplace.”
About Mergent’s Dividend Achievers™
A powerful tool for investors seeking a long-term portfolio of higher risk-adjusted returns, Mergent’s Dividend Achievers are companies that have increased their annual regular dividends for at least the past 10 consecutive years and have met specific liquidity screening criteria. The Dividend Achievers are typically companies with strong cash reserves, solid balance sheets and a proven record of consistent earnings growth. Mergent has been identifying these strong dividend-paying companies for more than 25 years.
The complete list of 2006 Dividend Achievers is available at www.dividendachievers.com. Mergent's Dividend Achievers Handbook, published quarterly by John Wiley & Sons, provides corporate information and financial data on all of the U.S. and Canadian Dividend Achievers companies, as well as a wide range of supplementary rankings.
About Mergent
Mergent, Inc., a Xinhua Finance company (TSE Mothers: 9399) is the preferred provider of business and financial data on global publicly listed companies. Currently headquartered in Charlotte, NC and New York City, with sales offices in key North American cities, Mergent also has a strong global presence, with offices in London, Shanghai, Tokyo, Toronto and Sydney. Mergent’s databases contain detailed equity, debt and corporate action information on over 15,000 U.S. public companies, 20,000 non-U.S. public companies and all U.S. municipal bonds.
For more than a century Mergent has been providing solutions to clients in the investment management, academic, research and corporate information fields. Today, that unique experience is combined with leading-edge technology to form a robust, diverse product line that operates under Mergent’s umbrella. These include; Mergent’s Dividend Achievers Indices – the premier benchmark for long-term returns; Ford Equity Research – a leading independent investment research firm; Mergent Online – a powerful web-based research portal that provides critical business information to support daily research and analysis; Mergent Manuals, Handbooks and Investment Guides; BondSource – which offers in-depth municipal and corporate fixed-income data, as well as end-of-day evaluation pricing; EventsData – providing real-time information on corporate actions, dividend payouts, news and updates directly to clients desktops. For more information, visit our websites, www.mergent.com and www.dividendachievers.com.
Contact Samantha Dumas:
Taylor Rafferty
205 Lexington Avenue
New York, NY 10016
(212) 889-4350
mergent@taylor-rafferty.com
(212) 413-7751
Mergent Contact:
Shirley Petersen
Vice President, Index Licensing
Mergent, Inc.
60 Madison Avenue
New York, NY 10010
About Xinhua Finance Limited
Xinhua Finance Limited is China’s unchallenged leader in financial information and media, and is listed on the Mothers board of the Tokyo Stock Exchange (symbol: 9399) (OTC ADRs: XHFNY). Bridging China’s financial markets and the world, Xinhua Finance serves financial institutions, corporations and re-distributors through four focused and complementary service lines: Indices, Ratings, Financial News and Investor Relations. Founded in November 1999, the Company is headquartered in Shanghai with 21 news bureaus and offices in 18 locations across Asia, Australia, North America and Europe. For more information, please visit www.xinhuafinance.com.
New York, NY, April 11, 2006 – Mergent, Inc., a leading provider of business and financial information on publicly listed companies, today announced total returns for its Dividend Achievers™ Index Family for the three months ending March 31. The quarter saw Mergent’s Dividend Achievers advance on a number of fronts. The start of 2006 marked the annual reconstitutions of the Dividend Achiever™ Indices, in which all indices allowing an increase in the number of constituents recorded an increase. Most notably, the International Dividend Achievers™ increased from 42 companies to 60 companies, adding to the group a number of international blue-chips including Cadbury Schweppes Plc and Lloyds TSB Group.
Mergent also added to its Dividend Achievers™ Index Family during the quarter, with a collaboration with The NASDAQ Stock Market, Inc (NASDAQ®; NASDAQ: NDAQ) to use Mergent’s proprietary Dividend Achievers™ performance methodology and apply it to US companies listed only on the NASDAQ. The NASDAQ Dividend Achievers™ Index is calculated using a market capitalization weighting and disseminated on a total return basis (NASDAQ:DVQT).
“This has been a remarkable quarter for Mergent’s Dividend Achievers,” commented Jonathan Worrall, CEO of Mergent. “Our Index Family is going from strength to strength, and as our recent collaboration with NASDAQ demonstrates, we remain committed to providing investors with the best dividend-focused investment products in the marketplace.”
About Mergent’s Dividend Achievers™
A powerful tool for investors seeking a long-term portfolio of higher risk-adjusted returns, Mergent’s Dividend Achievers are companies that have increased their annual regular dividends for at least the past 10 consecutive years and have met specific liquidity screening criteria. The Dividend Achievers are typically companies with strong cash reserves, solid balance sheets and a proven record of consistent earnings growth. Mergent has been identifying these strong dividend-paying companies for more than 25 years.
The complete list of 2006 Dividend Achievers is available at www.dividendachievers.com. Mergent's Dividend Achievers Handbook, published quarterly by John Wiley & Sons, provides corporate information and financial data on all of the U.S. and Canadian Dividend Achievers companies, as well as a wide range of supplementary rankings.
About Mergent
Mergent, Inc., a Xinhua Finance company (TSE Mothers: 9399) is the preferred provider of business and financial data on global publicly listed companies. Currently headquartered in Charlotte, NC and New York City, with sales offices in key North American cities, Mergent also has a strong global presence, with offices in London, Shanghai, Tokyo, Toronto and Sydney. Mergent’s databases contain detailed equity, debt and corporate action information on over 15,000 U.S. public companies, 20,000 non-U.S. public companies and all U.S. municipal bonds.
For more than a century Mergent has been providing solutions to clients in the investment management, academic, research and corporate information fields. Today, that unique experience is combined with leading-edge technology to form a robust, diverse product line that operates under Mergent’s umbrella. These include; Mergent’s Dividend Achievers Indices – the premier benchmark for long-term returns; Ford Equity Research – a leading independent investment research firm; Mergent Online – a powerful web-based research portal that provides critical business information to support daily research and analysis; Mergent Manuals, Handbooks and Investment Guides; BondSource – which offers in-depth municipal and corporate fixed-income data, as well as end-of-day evaluation pricing; EventsData – providing real-time information on corporate actions, dividend payouts, news and updates directly to clients desktops. For more information, visit our websites, www.mergent.com and www.dividendachievers.com.
Contact Samantha Dumas:
Taylor Rafferty
205 Lexington Avenue
New York, NY 10016
(212) 889-4350
mergent@taylor-rafferty.com
(212) 413-7751
Mergent Contact:
Shirley Petersen
Vice President, Index Licensing
Mergent, Inc.
60 Madison Avenue
New York, NY 10010
About Xinhua Finance Limited
Xinhua Finance Limited is China’s unchallenged leader in financial information and media, and is listed on the Mothers board of the Tokyo Stock Exchange (symbol: 9399) (OTC ADRs: XHFNY). Bridging China’s financial markets and the world, Xinhua Finance serves financial institutions, corporations and re-distributors through four focused and complementary service lines: Indices, Ratings, Financial News and Investor Relations. Founded in November 1999, the Company is headquartered in Shanghai with 21 news bureaus and offices in 18 locations across Asia, Australia, North America and Europe. For more information, please visit www.xinhuafinance.com.