Retirees looking for steady passive income could consider investing in top-quality dividend stocks with high yields. While these stocks act as a hedge against inflation and provide regular income, their solid earnings growth potential leads to a decent appreciation in their value, generating notable capital gains over time.
Notably, the TSX has several fundamentally strong companies with resilient business models and a growing earnings base to support future payouts. However, I’ll restrict myself to Canadian stocks offering high and reliable retirement yields.
Enbridge
Enbridge (TSX:ENB) is one of the most compelling dividend stocks with high yields that retirees could consider for generating reliable passive income. This energy infrastructure giant has rewarded its shareholders with uninterrupted dividend growth for 29 years and offers a lucrative yield of 6.8%.
Enbridge transports oil and gas and has a highly diversified asset base. Its diversified assets have a high utilization rate and add stability to its earnings and distributable cash flows (DCF). Moreover, the company earns a significant portion of its earnings through long-term contracts and power-purchase agreements, which support its earnings and payouts in all market conditions.
This energy company is poised to deliver steady earnings growth in the coming years, led by its multi-billion secured projects. Moreover, its investments in conventional and renewable energy assets and strategic acquisitions will accelerate its growth and drive its DCF per share.
Enbridge’s earnings and DCF per share are projected to grow at a mid-single-digit rate in the long term. This indicates that the company’s dividend could grow at a similar pace. Further, Enbridge’s dividend payout ratio of 60 to 70% of DCF is sustainable in the long term.
BCE
Retirees could consider adding shares of Canadian telecom giant BCE (TSX:BCE) to their passive income portfolios. BCE is known for enhancing its shareholders’ value with higher dividend payments. Moreover, the company offers one of the highest dividend yields near its current market price.
For instance, this telecom company has raised its dividends for 16 consecutive years, with the latest increase of 3.1% for 2024. Further, BCE stock offers an attractive yield of 8.3% based on the closing price of $47.84 on August 12.
The company’s focus on improving efficiency via cost-reduction measures and growing its customer base positions it well to grow earnings. Further, BCE is leveraging its leading broadband networks and products to enhance its user base, driving its financials and payouts. Further, the telco is focusing on capitalizing on new growth areas such as digital transformation and cloud and security services. These initiatives bode well for future growth and will likely support its dividend distributions.
SmartCentres REIT
SmartCentres Real Estate Investment Trust (TSX:SRU.UN) is another attractive high-yield stock for retirees. It is one of Canada’s largest fully integrated REITs (real estate investment trusts) and is known for offering reliable monthly dividend payments.
This REIT currently offers a monthly dividend of $0.154 per share, reflecting a high yield of about 7.7%.
SmartCentres owns a solid real estate portfolio with high-traffic centres, which witness solid demand from existing and new customers. This enables the firm to re-lease space easily and maintain high occupancy rates. Furthermore, SmartCentres boasts a high-quality tenant base, including major retailers and banks. These top tenants stabilize its cash flows and drive its collection rates.
The REIT is poised to benefit from its high occupancy rate, top-quality tenant base, and underutilized land bank. Moreover, its focus on reducing debt and a solid developmental pipeline of mixed-use properties augurs well for future growth, supporting its monthly distributions.
