SYS is a member of Broad Dividend Achievers and has been raising dividends for last 38 years. The most recent dividend increase was in December 2008. It remains to be seen if it will increase dividends later this year. I had reviewed this stock in February 2008 which at that time was a medium risk to dividend. My objective here is to analyze if SYY still continues to be a good dividend growth stock.

Trend Analysis
This section measures the trends for past 10 years of corporation's revenue and profitability. The parameters should show consistent growth trends. The image below shows the trend chart.

• Revenue: Increasing trend in revenue with average growth of 9.4% (3.4% standard deviation). Immediate past five years show reducing trend of growth rates from low teens to high single digits. This is sign of slow down in growth rates.
• Cash Flow: The cash flow is remaining flat in 2008 to 2009 with minor reduction. Free cash flow is almost equal to net income. The good aspect is that it continues to generate operating cash flow.
• EPS from continuing operation: In general, the EPS also has an increasing tread (with a blip in 2006 and 2009) with average growth rate as 13.2% (11.1%).
• Dividend per share: Dividends per share are consistently growing for the last 10 years.

Risk Parameter Calculation
Here I use the corporation's financial health to assign a risk number for measuring risk-to-dividends. The risk number for risk-to-dividends is 2.00. This is a medium risk category as per my 3-point risk scale. An increasing payout factor, historically high yield, negative EPS growth makes SYY dividend as a medium risk.