This article originally appeared on The DIV-Net on September 24, 2008

Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) has raised their quarterly dividend from $0.11/share to $0.13/share, an increase of 18%. The software giant, whose shares are down about 26% year to date has also announced that they are buying back up to $40 Billion in stock.

Here is a glance at Microsoft's recent dividend activity:

Fiscal 2004 -$3.24 (includes $3/special dividend)
2005 -$0.32
2006 - $0.35
2007 - $0.40
2008- $0.44
2009 - $0.52 Estimated

Excluding the special dividend paid in 2004, this represents a compounded annual growth rate of the dividend of 16.7%. It is also interesting to note that Microsoft's earnings per share have been on a steady annual growth path since 2002. MSFT now yields about 2%.