Four Dividend Stocks with Better Credit Ratings than the U.S. Treasury

Treasury bonds aren’t the low-risk investments they once were. Not with the U.S. having its credit rating slashed to AA+ status by Standard & Poor’s back in August. That’s lower than some dividend stocks, several of which offer investors higher yields than the less than 2 percent yields U.S. Treasury bonds have slipped to.

Smart Money’s Jack Hough reports that there are four American firms that still have perfect AAA credit ratings from both Standard & Poor’s and Moody’s. Better yet, they carry an average dividend yield of 3 percent.

Those companies are Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT), Exxon Mobil (NYSE: XOM), Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) and Automatic Data Processing (Nasdaq: ADP). Three of the four companies have increased their dividend payments for at least 25 years straight. The fourth, Microsoft, just approved a 25 percent dividend increase.

Hough examines other reasons why these dividend stocks are a smarter investment than Treasury bonds at the moment. Click here for his full analysis.