Persimmon has established a long reign as a dividend king not only among the UK’s publicly-listed housebuilders but in the broader market. Not even a global pandemic could unseat it.
London’s largest publicly-listed housebuilder will pay a final 2020 dividend sooner than expected, returning 110p a share to investors in August rather than splitting it over two payments this year. Confidence has been imbued by the rebuilding of an impressive cash pile of £1.32 billion at the end of June, not just more than half on the same point last year but also in 2019.
Pent-up demand and — more crucially — the stamp duty break applied to the first £500,000 of a property’s value fuelled demand and lifted prices. For Persimmon, it led
