1 High-Yield Dividend Stock You Can Buy and Hold for a Decade

BCE’s stock price remains attractively valued, with a dividend yield of almost 6% as it pursues AI growth.

Karen Thomas, MSc, CFA

Karen is a stock market enthusiast focused on uncovering those stocks that she believes the market has mispriced. She does this through fundamental and quantitative analysis of companies and their industries, as well as a study of future opportunities and trends. She holds a Masters degree in Finance, the CFA designation, and has over 20 years of experience in the investment management industry. Having worked at a major pension fund, as well as two leading mutual fund firms as an analyst and portfolio manager, she has solid investing expertise which she aims to share with her readers.

Published July 17, 8:00 pm EDT

Key Points

BCE stock, once a go-to dividend giant, cut its dividend by over 50% in May 2025 after a stretched balance sheet from debt-financed network upgrades collided with rising interest rates and increased competition, sending the stock down nearly 60% from 2022 highs to its current 5.65% yield.
Management is pivoting away from the mature, low-growth telecom business by reallocating capital to growth segments including the acquisition of Ziply (largest fibre provider in US Pacific Northwest), expanding Bell Media's digital content (now 45% of revenue vs. 19% previously with Crave subscribers up 25%), and staying out of pricing wars to focus on customer lifetime value.
BCE is positioning itself as a key AI infrastructure player through its AI Fabric ecosystem, with Bell Business Markets revenue up 9.7% (AI-powered solutions up 113%) in Q1 and management raising revenue targets from $1.5 billion to $2 billion by 2028, including a Saskatchewan AI data centre that will generate $500 million in revenue, $400 million EBITDA, and a 20% IRR at full run rate.

High-yield dividend stocks are a valuable addition to investor portfolios for extra dividend income. BCE Inc. (TSX: BCE) is yielding 5.7% today and offers investors a big opportunity to gain exposure to this recovering telecom giant.

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What happened?

BCE stock was once the go-to stock for dividend stability, predictability, and growth. There was little doubt that BCE would be a reliable dividend payor in one’s portfolio. Today, however, the story has changed quite dramatically.

After massive amounts of spending to upgrade its networks, BCE found itself in a difficult position. While the spending on fibre networks was necessary for BCE to maintain its competitive position, the company financed it with debt, as is typical for telecom companies.

This stretched BCE’s balance sheet. Then interest rates started rising and competition heated up due to regulatory changes. In May 2025, the company finally came to terms with the fact that its dividend was unsustainable. What followed was a more than 50% dividend cut. BCE’s stock price was already reflecting that this would happen and it had fallen significantly from its 2022 highs. It’s currently almost 60% lower.

What’s next for BCE?

Throughout all this, BCE has been changing with the times. The telecom business is no longer what it once was. It’s mature with little growth and new regulations that are resulting in higher competition, lower returns, and little incentive for telecom companies to make the needed capital investments in their businesses.

This is out of the company’s control. In response, management is focusing on improving the customer experience. The company is staying out of aggressive pricings wars, strengthening its value-added proposition for customers, and focusing on lifetime economics.

Beyond this, BCE has made the necessary decision to reallocate its capital investment to growth segments. For example, BCE acquired Ziply, the largest broadband and fibre internet provider in the US Pacific Northwest. The US fibre market is underpenetrated and this will give BCE more scale, while diversifying its operating footprint and establishing a platform for further expansion.

Also, BCE is building its digital media content offerings. Digital used to account for 19% of Bell Media’s total revenue, and now its 45% of the total and still growing. Crave is performing really well at this time and has grown its subscriber base by 25%.

Bell Business Markets

Finally, BCE is aiming to be a key player in the artificial intelligence (AI) buildout. BCE’s AI Fabric infrastructure is an ecosystem of data centres, partners, and solutions that includes cutting edge processing units and high-performance AI inferencing.

The economics of this business are strong and improve BCE’s growth profile. In Saskatchewan, BCE has a fully contracted AI data centre that’s under construction. At its full run rate, it will contribute $500 million of revenue, $400 million of earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA), and more than $250 million in free cash flow. Its internal rate of return (IRR) will be 20%.

In the last quarter, Bell business markets revenue increased 9.7%, driven by 113% growth in AI-powered solutions. Management’s revenue objective for this business has increased from $1.5 billion by 2028 just a little while ago to $2 billion. The momentum is going strong.

The bottom line

BCE stock is yielding a generous 5.7%, with an evolving business that’s showing some real potential in certain high growth areas. At the same time, BCE is managing the changes in the telecom industry the best that they can, keeping their focus on preserving the long-term health of the industry.

For patient investors comfortable with BCE’s risk profile, it’s a solid high yield dividend stock to buy. BCE’s stock price remains attractively valued, trading at approximately $30.