Despite UK stocks surging to record highs in 2025, there are plenty of income shares that haven’t been so lucky. And two that stand out among the worst performers are RWS Holdings (LSE:RWS) and Victrex (LSE:VCT), respectively down 57% and 37% since January.
Obviously, that’s a painful loss for current shareholders. But has this volatility secretly created an epic buying opportunity for dividend-seeking investors? After all, Victrex now has a juicy-looking 8.9% yield. And RWS is offering an even more impressive 16% payout!
Is a 16% yield too good to be true?
Let’s start with RWS and its enormous double-digit dividend. Typically, when yields get this big, it’s a major red flag of an incoming payout cut. And yet, following its latest half-year results, that hasn’t happened.
So is RWS a rare exception? The translation, localisation, and language enterprise has run into a few challenges this year that have put significant pressure on both its revenue and earnings. However, one of the most concerning headwinds is potential AI disruption.
While RWS is investing in the development of its own portfolio of AI tools, the growing list of alternative options is significantly limiting the group’s pricing power.
With the finance and legal sectors adopting these cheaper alternatives, sales have suffered. And the impact has only been made worse by project delays within the life sciences sector. The result of all this was a 60% collapse in underlying earnings.
However, even with these challenges, the company remains highly cash generative. And with a relatively small net debt position, its balance sheet offers some welcome wiggle room. Furthermore, with management switching strategies and doing a bit of restructuring, performance in the second half of 2025 improved significantly.
As such, guidance for full-year underlying pre-tax profits was reiterated at £60m. That’s still notably behind the £106.7m achieved in 2024. But it’s a drastic improvement versus the £18m achieved in the first half of 2025. And if this recovery momentum continues, dividends could ultimately be protected from a cut.
A rebound already underway?
Victrex is in a similar situation. Lower spending from the industrial and healthcare sectors saw demand for its PEEK polymer materials suffer.
However recently, market conditions have notably improved. Polymer volumes are now back on the rise and have reached 4,164 tonnes in its 2025 fiscal year (ended in September). That’s a 12% increase compared to a year ago, driven primarily by value-added resellers and industrials as global manufacturing steady recovers.
Despite higher volumes, the product mix has resulted in a lower average selling price, causing revenue to remain flat and underlying earnings to fall by 15%. And right now, the company isn’t generating enough profits to cover its dividend.
But with a well-funded balance sheet, Victrex similarly appears to have sufficient financial resources to maintain shareholder payouts in the short term while profits begin to recover.
The bottom line
Out of these two income shares, Victrex currently looks the most promising, in my eyes, and is worth closer inspection. It operates in a niche with significantly limited competition by comparison to RWS. And while RWS is taking action to prevent AI-disruption, it’s still too early to tell whether the firm can adapt to the shifting landscape.
