5 Extreme Dividend Stocks With Huge Upside Potential

2. Hercules Capital, Inc. (NYSE:HTGC)

Dividend Yield as of March 13: 13.47%

Upside Potential as of March 13: 37.6%

On March 13, UBS lowered its price recommendation on Hercules Capital, Inc. (NYSE:HTGC) to $15 from $19.50. The firm maintained a Neutral rating on the shares.

During the Q4 2025 earnings call, CEO Scott Bluestein said the company delivered another year of record operating performance. He noted that 2025 brought new highs for Hercules Capital in areas such as originations, platform expansion, and overall credit stability. Bluestein said the company set new annual records for both total and net investment income. Originations for the year reached nearly $4 billion, while gross fundings totaled about $2.28 billion. He also discussed how the company performed in a declining interest rate environment. Bluestein explained that Hercules Capital still covered 120% of its quarterly base distribution of $0.40 per share during the fourth quarter.

He added that the company maintained $0.82 per share in spillover income. According to Bluestein, there were no changes to the quarterly base distribution, and the company plans to continue paying the same supplemental distribution it paid last year. Bluestein also noted that assets under management grew to more than $5.7 billion. That represents an increase of over 20% compared with year-end 2024. He also pointed to record new debt and equity commitments of $3.92 billion, up 45.7% year over year. In addition, the company reported net debt portfolio growth of roughly $748.5 million.

Hercules Capital, Inc. (NYSE:HTGC) is a specialty finance company focused on providing financing solutions to venture capital-backed and institutional-backed companies across a range of technology and life sciences industries. The company is structured as an internally managed, non-diversified, closed-end investment company.