S&P/ASX 200 Index (ASX: XJO) dividend stock Steadfast Group Ltd (ASX: SDF) is marching higher today.
Shares in the insurance brokerage company closed yesterday trading for $6.01. In late afternoon trade on Wednesday, shares are changing hands for $6.11 apiece, up 1.7%.
For some context, the ASX 200 is up 0.8% at this same time.
Taking a step back, shares in the ASX 200 dividend stock have gained 10.3% since this time last year. Atop those capital gains, Steadfast also paid out 19.5 cents per share in fully franked dividends over the full year.
If we add that welcome passive income back in, then the 12-month accumulated gain for Steadfast shares works out to 13.8%. With some potential tax benefits from those franking credits.
And the team at Macquarie Group Ltd (ASX: MQG) forecast an even better performance from Steadfast shares in the year ahead.
Here's why.
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ASX 200 dividend stock tipped to outperform
Digging into the performance of Steadfast's market segments in September, Macquarie noted:
According to our latest market data, Sep '25 was a strong pricing month for Business Pack and Workers Comp, as weaknesses remained in Commercial Motor. The Sep quarter represents ~25.7% of the annual GWP placed for Commercial Lines on the Sunrise Platform, and ~24.6% of Personal Lines placed via the broker channel.
And Macquarie highlighted that the ASX 200 dividend stock is currently trading at a historic discount when compared to similar international insurance brokerage companies.
"SDF is trading at a ~10.9% discount (vs a 2.2% long-term premium) on a 2-yr fwd PERel to international brokers," Macquarie said.
That last bit, by the way, stands for two-year forward price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio estimates.
"At current valuations, we retain our outperform recommendation," Macquarie concluded.
The broker has a 12-month price target of $7.00 a share on the ASX 200 dividend stock. That represents a potential share price upside of 14.6% from current levels.
What's the latest from Steadfast?
Steadfast reported its FY 2025 results on 28 August.
Highlights included an 8.9% year on year increase in revenue to $1.83 billion. And on the bottom line, Steadfast's underlying net profit after tax (NPAT) of $296 million was up 17.2% from FY 2024.
As for that passive income, the ASX 200 dividend stock declared a final fully franked dividend of 11.70 cents per share, up 14.0% from last year's final dividend.
Commenting on those results on the day, Steadfast CEO Robert Kelly said:
FY25 continued our year-on-year record strong growth in revenue and profit, making it the twelfth consecutive increase since listing in 2013. This has resulted in a shareholder, who participated in the Steadfast listing and continues to hold their shares, experiencing a total shareholder return of 530.3% on their initial investment.
