We're just past the midpoint of the second quarter of 2019, where the pace of dividend cuts that have been announced to date in our near real-time sampling of these declarations is well ahead of the same point of time a year earlier in the second quarter of 2018. The following chart illustrates the cumulative number of dividend cuts by day of quarter for both 2018-Q2 and 2019-Q2, where we find that the cumulative number in 2019-Q2 is running near the threshold that would indicate recessionary conditions are present within the U.S. economy:

Here's the working list-to-date of our sampling through the midpoint of 2019-Q2, where the first part of our list focuses on firms that pay variable dividends to their shareholders, where changes in dividend payments automatically follow from changes in their revenues and earnings:

• Sachem Capital (NYSE: SACH)
• MV Oil Trust (NYSE: MVO)
• BP Prudhoe Bay Royalty Trust (NYSE: BPT)
• Mesabi Trust (NYSE: MSB)
• Mesa Royalty Trust (NYSE: MTR)
• Dorchester Minerals (NASDAQ: DMLP)
• Permian Basin Royalty Trust (NYSE: PBT)
• Blackstone Group (NYSE: BX)
• San Juan Basin Royalty Trust (NYSE: SJT)
• Permianville Royalty Trust (NYSE: PVL)
• CVR Partners (NYSE: UAN)
• SandRidge Permian Trust (NYSE: PER)
• SandRidge Mississippian Trust I (NYSE: SDT)
• SandRidge Mississippian Trust II (NYSE: SDR)
• AllianceBernstein (NYSE: AB)
• Viper Energy (NASDAQ: VNOM)
• Carlyle Group (NASDAQ: CG)
• Sabine Royalty Trust (NYSE: SBR)
• Chesapeake Granite Wash Trust (NYSE: CHKR)
• Apollo Global Management (NYSE: APO)
• ECA Marcellus Trust I (NYSE: ECT)
• Marine Petroleum Trust (NASDAQ: MARPS)
• Cross Timbers Royalty Tr (NYSE: CRT)
• Permianville Royalty Trust (NYSE: PVL)

If you noticed, two of these firms appear in this listing twice, because they pay dividends to their shareholders monthly and have decreased their dividends in both April and May 2019.

The second part of the listing consists of firms who set the level of their dividends independently of their revenues and earnings, where reductions are purposefully set by their boards of directors.

• Medley Management (NYSE: MDLY)
• Senior Housing Properties Trust (REIT) (NASDAQ: SNH)
• Blueknight Energy Partners (NASDAQ: BKEP)
• RPC (NYSE: RES)
• First Financial Bankshares (NYSE: FFIN)
• Martin Midstream Partners (NYSE: MMLP)
• Summit Midstream Partners (NYSE: SMLP)
• Kimbell Royalty Partners (NYSE: KRP)
• Artisan Partners Asset Management (NYSE: APAM)
• Annaly Capital Management (REIT) (NYSE: NLY)
• Falcon Minerals (NASDAQ: FLMN)
• TiVo (NASDAQ: TIVO)
• Ciner Resources (NYSE: CINR)
• American Capital Agency (NASDAQ: AGNC)
• Banc of California (NYSE: BANC)

We count 41 individual dividend cuts through the middle of 2019-Q2, with 22 announced by firms in the oil and gas sector, 13 in the financial sector (in which we group Real Estate Investment Trusts), and 4 from mining industry firms. Of the remaining two firms, one is in the chemical industry and one is a technology firm.

References

Seeking Alpha Market Currents. Filtered for Dividends. [Online Database]. Accessed 22 May 2019.

Wall Street Journal. Dividend Declarations. [Online Database]. Accessed 22 May 2019.