The Coles Group Ltd (ASX: COL) dividend has been announced with the FY26 result, and it was another pleasing payout for shareholders.
Coles has consistently delivered larger dividends in each of its annual results over the last several years, and FY26 was another good year for shareholders hoping for growth.
As the country's second-largest supermarket operator, it has market power few can match.
The FY26 result saw a number of growth figures for the business, including 2.8% revenue growth (and 3.7% growth for supermarkets), operating profit (EBITDA) grew 7.1%, underlying net profit increased 13.7%, and statutory net profit rose 1%.
The statutory net profit figure was impacted by $235 million of significant items relating to the Fair Work Ombudsman's proceedings.
However, the strength of the underlying net profit performance helped the board of directors declare another pleasing payout for investors.
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Coles dividend for FY26
The Coles board of directors decided to declare a fully-franked final dividend of 37 cents per share. This brings the full-year dividend for FY26 to 78 cents per share, representing a 13% year-over-year increase.
Based on the statutory net profit, the business delivered earnings per share (EPS) of 81.5 cents. Therefore, the full-year dividend represents 95.7% of statutory earnings, though it's a lower percentage of underlying net profit after tax.
At the time of writing, the Coles FY26 final dividend represents a dividend yield of 1.6% excluding franking credits and 2.2% including franking credits.
If we look at the annual payout, the dividend yield is 3.3% excluding franking credits and 4.7% including franking credits.
When will this be paid?
Before getting to the payment date, first, we need to look at the ex-dividend date.
The ex-dividend date is the cutoff day for dividend eligibility. Investors need to own shares before the ex-dividend date to be entitled to the upcoming payment.
With this upcoming dividend, the ex-dividend date is 3 September 2026. That means investors need to own Coles shares by the end of trading on 2 September 2026 to be entitled to this payment.
After that, investors will receive payment on 22 September 2026, so that's less than a month away.
Investors can also elect to receive new Coles shares rather than cash as the dividend. If they want to receive new shares, then they need to make that election with the dividend reinvestment plan by 5pm on Monday, 7 September 2026.
Dividend growth in FY27 looks promising, with the company announcing that supermarket sales growth in the first eight weeks of FY27 was consistent with the fourth quarter of FY26.
