The London stock market is well-known for offering a large selection of high-quality dividend shares. For people investment planning in Cheshire or Oswestry, the final quarter of 2025 saw a rise in UK dividends.
Data produced by Computershare, a financial services company, showed that payouts across multiple sectors were better than expected last year, jumping from 1.3% to £14.3 billion. Regular dividends, excluding extraordinary ‘one-off’ payments, rose to £13.9 billion.
Of key interest to investors is the strong performance of specific market sectors. These areas include energy, property and consumer, as well as companies from London’s AIM market. The aerospace and defence industries performed particularly well, whilst the financial sector, including banks, insurers and financial services, also saw dividends increase by £1.2 billion.
It should be noted that the same period saw headline payouts down 0.9% to £87.5 billion. There was also a rise in share buybacks. These reached £63.3 billion in 2025, up from £30.8 billion in 2019. Buybacks in 2025 amounted to 73p for every £1 in dividends. This compared with just 30p six years ago.
Computershare is expecting total dividends to increase by 1.5% this year to £88.8 billion, whilst regular dividends are predicted to go up by 2%. Taking the underlying picture, they’re tipped to rise by 2% year on year. On this basis, UK shares will carry an average 3.3% dividend yield this year. A manager at Computershare, Mark Cleland, said that whilst the overall trend is welcome for income investors, dividend payouts still have some way to go before regaining pre-pandemic highs.
