--- title: Costco Is Paying a Dividend Next Month. Here's the Deadline to Buy the Stock description: Costco is paying a $1.47 dividend next month, but is the stock worth buying? Here’s what investors should know about its valuation and outlook. authors: - name: Martha C. White role: Reporter url: https://money.com/author/martha-c-white/ education: BA, English, Princeton University at_money_since: 2015 articles: 362 covers: - Investing - Banking - Business - Career Advice - Credit - Credit Cards - Debt - Economy and Politics - Education - Federal Reserve Rate Cuts - Health and Wellness - Housing - Identity Theft - Insurance - Lifestyle - Loans - Mortgages - Personal Finance - Professional Services - Retirement - Shopping - Taxes - Technology also_seen_in: - The New York Times - The Wall Street Journal - CNN - Kiplinger Personal Finance - Time social: - https://www.linkedin.com/in/martha-c-white/ editors: - name: Katherine Peach role: Associate Editor url: https://money.com/author/katherine-peach/ bio: Katherine Peach is an associate editor with a focus on news and email at Money. She didn’t always intend to write about money. She’s a classically trained pianist who dreamed of becoming an archaeologist. However, in 2007 Katherine began working in financial publishing as an editor for Agora Inc. (Apparently, unearthing ideas about improving your personal finances isn’t such a bad career alternative!) Katherine’s writing and editing work has been featured in Investing Daily, Clever, Investor Junkie, The Palm Beach Letter, Truth & Plenty, Independence Monthly, NICHE, AmericanStyle, AntiqueWeek, Millennial Money, Money Done Right, TheStreet, Sure Dividend and many others. Katherine holds a Bachelor of Arts in Ancient Studies with concentrations in Archaeology and Ancient Languages and a minor in Literature from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. She is a member of Phi Beta Kappa. education: University of Maryland, Baltimore County at_money_since: 2025 articles: 14 covers: - Investing - Banking - Career Advice - Credit - Credit Cards - Debt - Economy and Politics - Education - Federal Reserve Rate Cuts - Health and Wellness - Housing - Identity Theft - Insurance - Lifestyle - Loans - Mortgages - Personal Finance - Professional Services - Retirement - Shopping - Taxes published: '2026-10-20T15:12:29.000Z' modified: '2026-10-20T15:12:29.000Z' section: Investing tags: - Investing - News word_count: 694 canonical: https://money.com/should-you-buy-costco-stock-dividend/ type: NewsArticle source: structured-blocks --- > **Disclosure:** We research all brands listed and may earn a fee from our partners. Research and financial considerations may influence how brands are displayed. Not all brands are included. [Learn more](https://money.com/page/disclaimer/). ![Costco and coins](https://img.money.com/2026/10/News-Costco-shareholders-dividends.jpg) Costco is known as a destination for Americans looking to save money on everything from TV dinners to TVs. But what about actually making money? The warehouse club is doling out a quarterly dividend of $1.47 per share next month. Is it worth it to buy the stock? Despite sticky inflation and a downbeat consumer, Costco reported earnings per share of $6.75 in its most recent quarterly report released last month. This beat Wall Street’s expectation of $6.54 per share. The retailer said it would issue dividends next month; investors who own the stock as of Oct. 30 are eligible. Wall Street pros say that Costco's [wide array](https://money.com/costco-hidden-perks/) of bargains and member benefits, including pricey purchases like electronic equipment and cruise packages, appeal to higher-income shoppers as well as families who stretch tight budgets by buying in bulk. “Costco has benefited from being more exposed to the higher-end consumer than a lot of the big-box retailers,” says Keith Buchanan, senior portfolio manager and partner at Globalt Investments. Costco, like other stocks that depend on consumer spending, is vulnerable to the impact of slowing wage growth that hasn’t kept up with persistent inflation. But compared to its big-box retail brethren, Costco has an additional revenue stream in its [membership](https://money.com/costco-retirement-plan-long-term-savings/) fees, Buchanan notes. “The last time they took membership rates higher, the street was surprised at how little attrition there was,” he tells Money. Investors are likely to assume that if sales contract, raising the cost of membership could provide a bulwark against eroding profits. ## So should you buy Costco stock before Oct. 30? Not everyone thinks Costco stock at its current valuation is worth it. "A great company is not automatically a great stock at any price," Gavin Magor, director of research and ratings at Weiss Ratings, wrote in a recent research [note](https://weissratings.com/en/weiss-ratings-daily/costco-s-members-keep-spending-but-it-s-walmart-that-earns-our-buy). Weiss currently has a "hold" rating on the stock. "Paid membership growth has now slowed for eight straight quarters. Paying a premium multiple for steadiness leaves little room for disappointment," Magor wrote. So the answer to whether or not you should buy Costco stock depends — like so many other investing decisions — on whether the retailer is a good fit for your long-term investing goals and risk profile, according to Arun Sundaram, senior vice president of investment strategy at CFRA Research. “For many older investors that are closer to retirement and want more predictable cash flow… dividend-paying stocks are more attractive” than stocks that can grow faster but are more volatile, like tech stocks, he says. And you can’t realize those gains until you sell the stock — another reason why investors who depend on their investment portfolio for income prefer dividend-producing stocks. At a current share price of roughly $990, next month's dividend amounts to a dividend yield of just 0.6%. Other consumer stocks have had higher recent dividend yields. For instance, PepsiCo's annual dividend yield is nearly 4.5%, and Clorox is close to 6%. But Costco has also distributed more generous one-off dividends after extremely good quarters, such as a $15 payout in January 2024 and a $10 payout in December 2020. For this reason, some experts suggest that investors might want to give Costco a second look right now. “A lot of investors look forward to that special cash dividend. Right now it looks pretty imminent, in our view," Sundaram says. “Costco tends to pay out these cash dividends once their cash balance starts to inflate a bit," he tells Money. “If you look at their cash and cash equivalents balance, it’s at $21.3 billion, and the last time they paid, that same balance was $17.9 billion,” he says. “We’re past that previous threshold," which might be an indication that the next super-sized dividend could be announced within the next year. Investing pros care more about a company’s fundamentals, especially if they plan to buy and hold, than the particular date of issuance. “We don't look at the timing of it,” Buchanan says. But if you had buying Costco stock on your to-do list anyway, then, sure, get that trade in by Oct. 30 and you can get a payout roughly equivalent to the chain’s famous [hot-dog-and-soda](https://money.com/item-prices-that-have-survived-inflation/) combo. ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "BreadcrumbList", "@id": "https://money.com/should-you-buy-costco-stock-dividend/#breadcrumb", "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "name": "Home", "item": "https://money.com" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "name": "Investing", "item": "https://money.com/investing/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 3, "name": "Dividends", "item": "https://money.com/dividends/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 4, "name": "Costco Is Paying a Dividend Next Month. 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