5 Best Dividend Paying Stocks to Buy Now

3. Exxon Mobil Corporation (NYSE: XOM)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 65
Dividend Yield as of August 2: 5.91% 

Exxon Mobil Corporation (NYSE: XOM) ranks 3rd on the 10 best dividend-paying stocks to buy now. The Texas-based oil and gas corporation has over 12,000 branded stations in the United States. Exxon Mobil Corporation (NYSE: XOM) pays an annual dividend of $3.48 per share and yields at 5.91%. The American oil and gas firm has increased its annual dividend for the last 37 years.

The company has a market cap of $243.77 billion. In the second quarter of 2021, Exxon Mobil Corporation (NYSE: XOM) reported an ex-items EPS of $1.10, beating estimates of $0.97. The company’s second-quarter revenue was $67.74 billion, beating revenue estimates of $65.02 billion. Shares of XOM jumped 32% over the last twelve months.

At the end of the first quarter of 2021, 65 hedge funds in the database of Insider Monkey held stakes worth $2.77 billion in Exxon Mobil Corporation (NYSE: XOM), up from 63 hedge funds in the previous quarter holding stakes worth $2.21 billion.

Harding Loevner mentioned Exxon Mobil Corporation (NYSE: XOM) in its Q1 2021 investor letter. Here is what the fund said:

“We felt that our remaining energy holding, ExxonMobil, with its stronger balance sheet, was in a better position to ride out the cyclical slump in oil demand and even perhaps take advantage of it by investing counter-cyclically. While ExxonMobil does plan to increase capital expenditure, we’ve been disappointed in its regrettable failure to address ongoing emission trends, which reflects poorly on management’s foresight. As a result, we sold our ExxonMobil holdings.”