It's easy to become hyper-focused on bad times, but investors in Wesfarmers shares might want to look at the company's strong long-term performance instead. While this year has been rough on the Wesfarmers share price, the S&P/ASX 200 Index (ASX: XJO) stock has been dutiful over the last five years.
In fact, investors who have held the retail-focused conglomerate's stock for that time have been rewarded in spades.
Not only have they watched the Wesfarmers share price grow 50%, but the company has also handed out nearly a quarter of its current share price in dividends.
At the time of writing, Wesfarmers shares are trading for $45.23.
Read on to find out how much of the company's earnings it has handed back to shareholders over the last five years.
Wesfarmers shares offer $10.49 in dividends over 5 years
Yes, you read that right. Wesfarmers has handed investors $10.49 per share in dividends over the last half-decade.
Here's a breakdown of all the dividends paid by Wesfarmers shares in that time:
| Wesfarmers dividends | Amount offered |
| August 2017 (final) | $1.20 |
| February 2018 (interim) | $1.03 |
| August 2018 (final) | $1.20 |
| February 2019 (interim and special) | $1 and $1 |
| September 2019 (final) | 78 cents |
| February 2020 (interim) | 75 cents |
| August 2020 (final and special) | 77 cents and 18 cents |
| February 2021 (interim) | 88 cents |
| September 2021 (final) | 90 cents |
| February 2022 (interim) | 80 cents |
The largest dividend offered by the company in that time was $1.20. It handed investors such an amount twice — first at the end of financial year 2017 and again at the end of financial year 2018.
It also offered two special dividends worth $1 and 18 cents respectively. The latter was offered in 2020 and included proceeds from the sale of a significant stake in Coles Group Ltd (ASX: COL).
It's also worth mentioning that each of Wesfarmers' payouts have been fully franked, meaning they could save some shareholders some extra coin at tax time.
As of Tuesday's close, Wesfarmers' shares were trading with a 3.8% dividend yield.
