* Five Stocks Raising Their Dividends

Many years ago my grandmother made the statement, "Everyone I know is either dead, or dying." I thought it was an odd statement since everyone I knew was either getting married or having kids. Your perspective depends on who you run with. Contrary to the perception from popular media, not all companies are cutting dividends, many are still raising them, and some are starting a new dividend program.

* New Premium Feature

It has been nearly a month since the introduction of the D4L-Dashboard. Since this premium service was designed for the serious dividend investor looking for more frequent visibility into more dividend stocks, I was moderately surprised and humbled at the positive response

D4L-Dashboard received during its first month. As a thanks to those who subscribed, I want to offer an additional premium feature as part of your subscription. 

Each week, as part of the process of updating the D4L-Dashboard I look at several companies and either create a new analysis or freshen the data of an existing analysis.

* Five Dividend Stocks With Different Reasons Not To Buy

Sometimes good companies aren't good buys, and this is not always a bad thing. Often it is a result of the market over reacting in a positive direction. The stocks simply become overvalued, but their underlying fundamentals remain excellent. Below are a couple of companies that fall into this group:

* Has The Insurance Industry Finally Turned The Corner?

There are not many companies whose fortunes are as closely tied to the stock market as those in the insurance industry. When the market is climbing, insurers will often soar beyond the market, and will fall harder when the market declines. With the recent uptick in the market, is now a good time to consider insurance companies?

* Becton Dickinson & Co. (BDX) Dividend Stock Analysis

This article originally appeared on The DIV-Net July 27, 2009.

Linked here is a detailed quantitative analysis of Becton Dickinson & Co. (BDX). Below are some highlights from the above linked analysis:

Company Description: Becton, Dickinson and Co provides a wide range of medical devices and diagnostic products used in hospitals, doctors' offices, research labs, and other settings.

* Weekly Links: August 2, 2009

Each Sunday I highlight the Carnivals I participated in over the past week, along with any notable articles that I came across. For those readers not familiar with carnivals, it's where personal finance bloggers submit their best articles of the week with one blog serving as the host. The entries are separated into various categories such as Investing, Credit, Debt, Budgeting, Frugality, Wealth Building, Money Management, Financial Planning, Insurance, Taxes, The Economy, Real Estate, et. al. Below are the carnivals that I participated in this week, along with a link to my article: