The outlook for the S&P 500's dividends through 2026 has improved in the month since we last presented our previous snapshot of their future. For the most part, they have improved with the 2026-Q1 looking to show the biggest jump.

Before we go any farther, we're referring to future quarters as they apply to dividend futures contracts, not regular calendar quarters! For dividend futures contracts, 2026-Q1 begins on Saturday, 20 December 2025 and will end on the third Friday of March 2026.

Here is our summary of how the outlook for the S&P 500's dividends has changed in the past month for the final quarter of 2025 and the upcoming four quarters of 2026:

• 2025-Q4: Decrease of $0.03, declining to $19.91 per share
• 2026-Q1: Increase of $0.57, rising to $21.46 per share
• 2026-Q2: Increase of $0.01, rising to $19.74 per share
• 2026-Q3: Increase of $0.14, rising to $20.01 per share
• 2026-Q4: No change, holding at $19.79 per share

The following animated chart shows how expectations for the S&P 500's quarterly dividends per share changed in the month from 14 November 2025 to 15 December 2025. If you're reading this article on a site that republishes our RSS news feed, you may need to click through to our site to see the animation.
 

This is our last update for 2025, our next snapshot will be taken in mid-January 2026. Because it will soon be very relevant, be sure to read the "More About Dividend Futures Data" section, which explains why the quarterly dividends Standard and Poor will report for the S&P 500 are different from dividend futures data. We anticipate S&P will report the index' quarterly dividends for the calendar quarter of 2025-Q4 early in 2026.
 

More About Dividend Futures Data

How changes in the outlook for dividends at specific points of time in the future contribute to changes in stock prices is described by this math.

For this series, we have been taking a snapshot of the CME Group's S&P 500 quarterly dividend futures data shortly after the second or third week of each month.

Dividend futures indicate the amount of dividends per share to be paid out over the period covered by each quarter's dividend futures contracts, which start on the day after the preceding quarter's dividend futures contracts expire and end on the third Friday of the month ending the indicated quarter. So for example, as determined by dividend futures contracts, the now "current" quarter of 2025-Q4 began on Saturday, 20 September 2025 and will end on this Friday, 19 December 2025. From the perspective of dividend futures, 2026-Q1 will become the current quarter on Saturday, 20 December 2025.

Because dividend futures are tied to options contracts that run on this schedule, that makes these figures different from the quarterly dividends per share figures that are reported by Standard and Poor. S&P reports the amount of dividends per share paid out during regular calendar quarters after the end of each quarter. This term mismatch accounts for the differences in dividends reported by both sources, with the biggest differences between the two typically seen in the first and fourth quarters of each year.

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