The Rouse Co. announced plans yesterday to raise its quarterly common stock cash dividend to shareholders to 28 cents per share, a 12 percent increase over the company's 1997 dividend.
The Columbia-based real estate concern said that the new dividend rate will be payable March 31 to stockholders of record as of March 16.
Rouse began paying a dividend on its common shares in 1978, and in the past two decades has increased the payout 18 times, for a compound annual growth rate averaging more than 15 percent.
The dividend marks Rouse's first since the company converted to a real estate investment trust Jan. 1.
Rouse last raised its common stock dividend in February 1997, when a 13.6 percent increase over the 1996 level raised the payout to $1 per year for the first time.
The new annual payout will be $1.12 per share.
Rouse's board of directors also approved a regular 75 cents per share quarterly dividend yesterday on the company's Series B convertible preferred stock. That dividend will be payable April 1 to shareholders of record as of March 16.
Pub Date: 2/27/98
