Dividend yield returns to 5%! The stock-bond yield spread widens to a historically high level. The CSI Red Chip Dividend ETF (515080) has experienced net inflows of 570 million for four consecutive days.

On the afternoon of April 7, the three major indexes rose and then gave back gains, and the market continued to show a choppy, diversified pattern. Two-market classic dividend blue-chip benchmark——China Securities Dividend ETF from China Merchants (515080) continued to attract inflows of risk-avoidance capital, securing net subscriptions for 4 consecutive trading days totaling 570M yuan, drawing nearly 1B yuan over the past 10 days, and its latest scale surpassed 9.1 billion yuan to set a new high.

Notably, as of April 3, the latest dividend yield of the CSI Dividend Index had rebounded toabove 5%、****reaching 5.03%. Meanwhile, the yield on the 10-year government bonds for the same period was only 1.82%, widening the yield spread between stocks and bonds to 3.21%, a historically very high percentile.

Looking back at the first quarter, during the market’s pricing logic from “betting on elasticity”** shifting to “locking in certainty”**, the defensive characteristics of high-dividend assets have been continuously revalued.

Huatai Securities noted that the situation in the Middle East has been repeatedly fluctuating alongside investors seeking safety, and China’s A-share sentiment index is still in the “panic” range, suggesting that dividends may still retain value as core holdings. Xingzheng Strategy also believes that with the outcome of geopolitical conflicts still uncertain and the quality of earnings in the reporting season yet to be tested, dividend assets are becoming a safer direction with relatively strong consensus.

Judging from the dividend data of constituent stocks, the CSI Dividend Index has already seen 72 constituent stocks disclose their 2025 dividend plans, with cumulative cash dividends totaling 909.1 billion yuan. Among them, 16 companies will distribute more than 10 billion yuan, and 14 companies more than 20 billion yuan.

Based on historical dividend records, the constituent stocks’ annual dividend payout ratios have remained stable in the 33%-45% range. This continuously stable record of high dividends confirms the index’s capacity for sustainable dividend distribution.

According to materials, the China Merchants CSI Dividend ETF (515080) tracks the CSI Dividend Index, selecting 100 stocks from the Shanghai and Shenzhen markets with high cash dividend yields and dividend distributions that have remained consecutive and stable. Since its listing, it has already delivered 16 dividend distributions. In the past two years, it has maintained a stable and sustainable quarterly dividend schedule. The index’s top six overweight industries are banks, coal, and transportation, among others.

Source: China Merchants Fund

Risk warning: Funds involve risk; invest with caution.