Key Takeaways
- At today’s prices, $1,000 a month in dividends takes 10,811 shares of AT&T, 9,091 shares of Comcast or 4,241 shares of Verizon.
- Verizon’s 6.1% yield makes it the cheapest of the three by about $43,000, and its check is the one I’d want.
- Verizon pays out the biggest share of its free cash flow, 52% over the last 12 months, but that still leaves plenty of room, and its free cash flow is growing.
- Comcast covers its dividend with the most room, but its split into two companies, due by the middle of next year, leaves its dividend plans open.
For a hypothetical retiree who wants a $1,000 monthly dividend check from a single stock, AT&T (T), Comcast (CMCSA) and Verizon Communications (VZ) can all deliver. They just charge very different prices for it.
At today’s prices, Verizon’s 6.1% yield gets there with 4,241 shares, or about $197,600. Comcast takes 9,091 shares at a 5.3% yield, about $227,500, and AT&T, yielding 5.0%, takes 10,811 shares, about $240,700.
But a cheaper check only helps if it keeps coming. Here’s each position, along with how much of its free cash flow each company pays out in dividends:
| Stock | Shares | Cost | Yield | Income a month | Cash dividend payout ratio, TTM | Cash dividend payout ratio, forward |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| AT&T | 10,811 | $240,653 | 5.0% | $1,000 | 44% | 46% |
| Comcast | 9,091 | $227,457 | 5.3% | $1,000 | 24% | 36% |
| Verizon | 4,241 | $197,631 | 6.1% | $1,000 | 52% | 53% |
Sources: TIKR, StockAnalysis. Today’s prices; dividends at each company’s current annual rate. TTM is the 12 months to Sept. 30, 2026; forward is the fiscal 2026 consensus.
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AT&T’s dividend is staying put
AT&T is shutting down its copper network and building out fiber. Third-quarter revenue rose 5.3% from a year earlier to $32.3 billion, even as legacy revenue fell 24.5%. Its third-quarter release on Oct. 21 said it plans to keep the dividend at $1.11 a share a year, down from $2.08 in fiscal 2020, so the check stays flat.
From fiscal 2023 to fiscal 2025, AT&T paid out between 40% and 44% of its free cash flow in dividends.
Over the 12 months to Sept. 30, that was a comfortable 44%, and it’s 46% on analysts’ fiscal 2026 estimates.
Debt is the weak spot. AT&T puts its net debt at 3.13x adjusted EBITDA after its EchoStar spectrum purchase, and it doesn’t expect to get back to its 2.5x target until 2029. That debt helped send shares down about 6% on Oct. 21, despite an earnings beat.
Comcast has the most room, and the most moving parts
Comcast is spending to hold on to its broadband customers. It lost 144,000 domestic broadband customers in the third quarter, and it’s moving the rest to new pricing and offering free wireless lines. Co-CEO Michael Cavanagh said on the call that “These investments are creating near-term financial pressure.” Third-quarter free cash flow fell 14.8% from a year earlier to $4.2 billion.
Even so, Comcast pays out the least of the three: a very well-covered 24% of its free cash flow over the 12 months to Sept. 30. Its dividends paid rose every year from $2.60 billion in fiscal 2016 to $4.89 billion in fiscal 2025, against $21.9 billion of free cash flow in that last year.
Per share, the dividend rose from $0.92 in fiscal 2020 to $1.32 in fiscal 2025, or 7.5% a year. Analysts see less room ahead, with the ratio rising to 36% on their fiscal 2026 estimates.
The bigger unknown for a retiree is the split. Comcast plans to separate into two public companies by the middle of next year, and it has paused buybacks until then while still paying its dividend. What each company pays afterward isn’t settled. In July, CFO Jason Armstrong said Comcast would “take the coming months, obviously, to work through capital allocation, capital structure policies.”
Verizon is growing the cash behind its check
Verizon’s CEO, Dan Schulman, has little patience for free lines. “Net adds are easy if your cost of acquisition goes way up and you give away a free line. I don’t consider free lines to even be net adds. I think they’re churn waiting to happen,” he said on Verizon’s third-quarter call.
Verizon still added 406,000 postpaid phones in the quarter, and its free cash flow rose 12.1% from a year earlier to $7.8 billion. Free cash flow rose from $14.1 billion in fiscal 2022 to $20.1 billion in fiscal 2025, while dividends paid rose from $10.8 billion to $11.5 billion.
That’s 52% of free cash flow paid out over the 12 months to Sept. 30, and 53% on analysts’ fiscal 2026 estimates. It’s the most of the three, but still comfortable. Raises are small, from $2.48 a share in fiscal 2020 to $2.73 in fiscal 2025, or 1.9% a year. Still, management says, “We remain committed to growing the dividend.”
Verizon’s check is the one I’d want
For $1,000 a month, I’d take Verizon. As the least covered of the three, it’s the one most at risk of a cut. But that’s a relative thing here: it still keeps nearly half its free cash flow after the dividend, and that cash is growing. Plus, it costs about $43,000 less than AT&T for the same check.
Comcast has a real case, with the most room and the fastest raises. If both companies come out of the split with dividends as well covered as today’s, it could end up the better check. AT&T’s check is safe, but flat.
The wild card for both phone companies came on Nov. 6, when Elon Musk said SpaceX “could just acquire that legacy telco and use their spectrum, you know, ten times more effectively,” without naming a target. The New York Post reported on Nov. 9 that Verizon and AT&T had both turned down SpaceX’s requests for network access. A buyer for either one would change what happens to that check.
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Disclaimer:
Please note that the articles on TIKR are not intended to serve as investment or financial advice from TIKR or our content team, nor are they recommendations to buy or sell any stocks. We create our content based on TIKR Terminal’s investment data and analysts’ estimates. Our analysis might not include recent company news or important updates. TIKR has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. Thank you for reading, and happy investing!
