On Wednesday Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) shares gained 1% in extended trading after the company announced that it was raising its quarterly dividend by $0.05.
Share Repurchase Program
The company has also authorized a $40 billion stock buyback. Under the leadership of CEO Satya Nadella, the company has been buying back its shares. In the fiscal year ended June 30, Microsoft bought back it’s a stock worth around $19.54 billion. The year before stock buybacks were around $10.72 billion. In the last five years under the tenure of Nadella, the company has seen it’s stock almost quadruple and exceed a trillion-dollar market cap.
The company has aggressively been repurchasing its stock and at the current rate, they are likely to use all the $40 billion in the latest repurchase program within two years. The new share repurchase program does not have an expiration period but the company could choose to terminate it any time.
Growing Dividends
The company is increasing its dividends by 5 cents barely a year after increased them. The board of directors approved a $0.51 quarterly dividend which reflects an 11% increase over the quarter before. This translates to $2.04 annually. Microsoft has been paying dividends to stockholders since 2003 and it has been pumping up its quarterly dividend each year.
Microsoft has indicated that it will pay shareholders of record on November 21 a dividend of $0.51 on December 12. The 11% increase is an improvement from last year’s dividend increase of 9.5%. The increase is slightly more than the company’s average dividend growth percentage of around 10.4%.
The share repurchase program and dividend increase are a no brainer for Microsoft. In 2019 the company brought around $38.3 billion in free cash flow of which $13.8 billion was given to shareholders in the form of dividends. The company returned around $33 billion to shareholders this is inclusive of the cash spent on stock repurchases.
Considering how trivial the company’s dividends are relative to its free cash flow, it appears like Microsoft will keep increasing its dividends each year.
A Clear Focus On Groundbreaking Technology
Global spending on security solutions is projected to reach $7.4 billion in 2019 and increase to over $11.3 billion by 2025 with a CAGR of 8.2%. The urban Security explosives and Weapons Detection market is slated to grow to nearly $7.5 billion by 2025 and is forecast to see consistent growth for the next several years [2].
What does this mean? Well, for investors it could signal big opportunities but with so many large companies targeting surveillance systems and weapon detection devices as a “go-to,” is there anything that could truly disrupt this market?
In short, yes
Liberty Defense (SCAN.V) (LDDFF) Is Positioning To Change The Face Of Threat Detection For Good
The truth of the matter is that mass shootings now happen more than once a day in the US and as we’ve come to find, there’s no real way to stop these attacks after an attacker enters a space. This is where the real opportunity is: stopping an attack before someone even enters a vulnerable space.
Liberty Defense (TSX: SCAN.V) (OTC: LDDFF) plans to do that using HEXWAVE, a next-generation high-tech security scanning system that will use advanced, low-power radar, 3D-imaging, and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to screen people at public gatherings such as sports games, unobtrusively.
Liberty Defense (SCAN.V) (LDDFF) Is Positioning To Change The Face Of Threat Detection For Good
The truth of the matter is that mass shootings now happen more than once a day in the US and as we’ve come to find, there’s no real way to stop these attacks after an attacker enters a space. This is where the real opportunity is: stopping an attack before someone even enters a vulnerable space.
Liberty Defense (TSX: SCAN.V) (OTC: LDDFF) plans to do that using HEXWAVE, a next-generation high-tech security scanning system that will use advanced, low-power radar, 3D-imaging, and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to screen people at public gatherings such as sports games, unobtrusively.
The advanced attack prevention system can detect if someone is armed before they enter a building using radar energy and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to detect weapons and explosives in real-time. You may be thinking that the processes and screening technology that you see in airports can achieve the same thing in our communities.
Urban Threat Detection
But we’re talking about urban detection; where high people traffic flow and attempts to provide airport-like screening processes can be extremely disruptive to business activity because of security entry delays.
As important to providing a higher rate of threat screening is that there also needs to be a way to detect other potential mass attack weapons including explosives, pyrotechnics and other non-metallic threats.
Utilizing a new disruptive technology under an exclusive global license from MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), Liberty Defense (TSX: SCAN.V) (OTC: LDDFF) is developing HEXWAVE.
The advanced attack prevention system can detect if someone is armed before they enter a building using radar energy and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to detect weapons and explosives in real-time. You may be thinking that the processes and screening technology that you see in airports can achieve the same thing in our communities. But we’re talking about urban detection; where high people traffic flow and attempts to provide airport-like screening processes can be extremely disruptive to business activity because of security entry delays.
As important to providing a higher rate of threat screening is that there also needs to be a way to detect other potential mass attack weapons including explosives, pyrotechnics and other non-metallic threats.
Utilizing a new disruptive technology under an exclusive global license from MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), Liberty Defense (TSX: SCAN.V) (OTC: LDDFF) is developing HEXWAVE.
Click Here To Learn More About Liberty Defense and its HEXWAVE
