Calculating the Dividend Yield

• 1). Get a quote for the current price of the stock. You can enter the ticker symbol into your broker's search function or use the search function of free websites such as Yahoo! Finance and Google Finance. The ticker symbol is used to identify the stock and can always be found on a public company's website under "Investor Relations" or "Investors." The price listed is the cost for one share of that stock.
  
  For example, if stock GHI is listed at $40 per share, it will cost $40 for one share of GHI.
  
  
• 2). Find the dividend. On the quote page the dividend will also be listed, along with whether it is paid quarterly or annually. If the dividend is paid quarterly, this number must be multiplied by four to get the annual dividend.
  
  For example, if GHI pays a quarterly dividend of 20 cents, the calculation for the annual dividend is as follows:
  
  20 cents x 4 = 80 cents
  
  The annual dividend payment for GHI is 80 cents.
  
  If you owned 100 shares of GHI, your annual payment from dividends would be calculated as follows:
  
  20 cents x 4 x 100 = $80
  
  You will receive $80 in dividends annually.
  
  
• 3). Divide the annual dividends per share by the current share price.
  
  Using the example from Step 1, if GHI is trading at $40 per share, and pays 80 cents in dividends annually, the calculation is as follows:
  
  $0.80 / $40 = .02, or 2 percent.
  
  In this example, stock GHI has a dividend yield of 2 percent.