How much will American Express pay out in dividends this year?

American Express (AXP -2.68%) is one of the largest financial institutions in the United States and, like most large banks, pays a quarterly dividend. While its dividend yield of about 1.2% as of this writing doesn’t exactly make it a “high dividend” stock, you might be surprised by how much money the company sends to its shareholders each year.

How much will American Express pay out in dividends this year?

Let’s start with the short answer. There are 710,910,000 American Express shares outstanding as of this writing. Each of these shares entitles investors to a dividend of $2.80 per year. Based on this information, American Express is expected to pay out $1.99 billion in dividends in 2024.

The number of shares could certainly change a bit, as American Express usually buys back some of its own shares each year. But this should be a good estimate.

Next year could be very different

Although American Express doesn’t have a perfect track record of dividend growth, it tends to increase payouts most years. Over the past decade, Amex’s dividend has grown by about 170%, and the company has increased the payout every year except for a two-year period during the COVID-19 pandemic.

While we have no idea what dividend increase American Express will offer shareholders in 2025, and there’s no guarantee the company will pay one at all, the average dividend increase over the past decade has been around 10%. Therefore, it would be reasonable to expect something in that stage next year.