IT infrastructure products and services specialist Softcat (LSE: SCT) has released an upbeat set of results for the year to 31 July. They show that the company is making good progress with its strategy. Evidence of this can be seen in its rise in revenue of 12.8% and increase in adjusted operating profit of 15.2% versus the previous year.

These figures were achieved against a backdrop of modest growth in the UK economy. This has been reflected in slow growth in the IT market, which shows that Softcat is a relatively resilient stock during difficult periods. It has been able to deliver impressive new contract wins and to increase the amount spent by existing customers. It has achieved this through a focus on customer service, which has helped to differentiate it from sector peers.

However, Softcat’s outlook is somewhat disappointing. In the current financial year it’s forecast to record a rise in earnings of just 1%. This could prove to be a temporary blip and a return to higher levels of growth may take place in future years. However, with the company’s shares trading on a price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio of 15.4, they seem to lack appeal given that near-term outlook. As such, it may be worth waiting for an improved profit performance before buying-in.

OMG!

Also reporting today within the tech sector was Oxford Metrics (LSE: OMG). It provides products and services for the life sciences, entertainment and other sectors. Its trading in the final part of the financial year has been strong. This means that revenues in excess of £29m will be reported, which is ahead of last year’s figure of £25.8m and is also ahead of market expectations.

OMG’s pre-tax profit will be in line with expectations. Its Vicon business has performed well in all geographies due to recently refreshed products. It has also benefitted from weaker sterling versus the US dollar. Similarly, OMG’s Yotta has continued to benefit from a strengthened recurring software revenue stream in the UK and in international markets. However, the firm has decided to discontinue OMG Life in order to focus on Vicon and Yotta.

Looking ahead, it’s forecast to record a rise in earnings of 20% in the current financial year. This puts it on a PEG ratio of only 0.7, which indicates that it offers excellent value for money. Furthermore, its strategy to focus on Vicon and Yotta should allow it to develop faster growth and more efficiencies over the medium term.

While it still has a long way to go to reach ARM’s size and status, OMG seems to be a worthy buy for tech-focused long-term investors.

The post Is this tech stock set to be the next ARM Holdings? appeared first on The Motley Fool UK.

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My plan was to hold the technology leader for the long term, and now that ARM has gone from the London market I’m looking for new homes for my technology money. One possible contender is AIM company IQE (LSE: IQE), the global supplier of advanced wafer products and services to the semiconductor industry.

High levels of intellectual property

IQE’s core business is ‘Epitaxy’, which the firm describes as the first stage in the process of manufacturing critical components in a range of devices from mobile handsets to solar cells and LEDs. 

I worried that the business could be providing a commodity product, which would be a less attractive business model than ARM’s intellectual property-driven one. However, IQE insists that its manufacturing process requires high specification cleanrooms, sophisticated production tools and high levels of intellectual property.

ARM’s ongoing high double-digit profit margins reveal the strength of the firm’s niche in its markets. IQE’s net margin has been modest in comparison — single digits from 2011 through to 2014 then ballooning to around 17% during 2015.

Building licensing revenues

IQE’s chief executive said in an interim statement last month that the firm’s continuing strong financial performance reflects progress in diversifying revenues and growing a portfolio of intellectual property.  To me, that suggests that IQE could be developing its business to become less commodity-style and more like a well-defended niche operator with similarities to ARM. The recent improvements in net margin add weight to that theory but it’s too early to be sure.

The great strength of ARM’s business is its licensing and royalty model that enables the firm to reap the rewards of marketing its intellectual property. IQE is moving in that direction too. The firm has developed a portfolio of intellectual property for advanced semiconductor materials and generated £3.5m of license income in the first half of this year. IQE’s IP portfolio is helping the company to differentiate itself, and to create a platform for growth, according to the top director. However, City analysts following the firm expect the company to post overall revenue around £124m this year, so there’s a long way to go before license revenue becomes a big part of IQE’s business.

In transformation?

IQE could be in the early stages of transforming itself from a mediocre business with humble profit margins into something a little more special. If higher margins prove to be enduring, the firm could make a good investment from here. The chief executive reckons that several growth areas could help propel IQE forward. 

At today’s share price of 30.5p, you can pick up IQE shares on a forward price-to-earnings ratio of just over 10 for 2017, which seems undemanding, although the shares have recently rerated up to adjust for better margins and higher profits. I reckon IQE is one to keep a close eye on.

The post Is IQE plc worth some of your ARM Holdings winnings? appeared first on The Motley Fool UK.

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Kevin Godbold has no position in any shares mentioned. The Motley Fool UK has no position in any of the shares mentioned. We Fools don't all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors.

All that glitters

Shares in Fresnillo (LSE: FRES) soared by 56% from the vote to the end of July, closing at 1,931p. An upbeat production report a few days before the decision didn’t do any harm, but the real driver for the world’s largest primary producer of silver and Mexico’s second largest gold producer is the rising price of the metals — silver and gold have both spiked since the eventful day.

I think chasing the prices of gold and silver up and down is a mug’s game, myself. And though there’s a good argument that these prices will remain high while there’s so much political and economic uncertainty, I see it as a poor approach to long-term investment.

After the rise, Fresnillo shares are now valued at a massive 60 times forecast earnings, dropping only to 40 based on a predicted 50% rise in EPS in 2017 — and dividends of only around 1% are barely worth talking about. There’s a lot more profit growth built into that kind of valuation, and it will take considerable further gold and silver price rises to justify it. I see that as gambling, not investing, and it’s a no from me.

Mining recovery

Glencore (LSE: GLEN) looks like a more rational long-term investment. And though we haven’t seen any sustained recovery in metals prices yet, Glencore has been cutting costs, and has disposed of assets and used the proceeds to reduce its massive debt hole.

That’s led to a 38% rise in the share price since 27 June, to a month-end 187p — a 162% rise from February’s low. But has the recovery been a  bit too enthusiastic or is there more to come? With the shares on a forward P/E of 38, the climb might look a bit overdone. But that would fall to 23 in 2017 based on the 60% EPS rise predicted for that year, and we’d be looking at a PEG ratio of only 0.4.

That’s typically considered an attractive growth indication, though it really doesn’t mean much unless that growth is going to be sustained. But though I do think we’re likely to see short-term volatility in the share price, Glencore should be a solid long-term investment.

A quick takeover

One of the biggest stories of the month was the recommended takeover approach from Japan’s SoftBank for chip designer ARM Holdings (LSE: ARM), which gave shareholders an overnight profit of 41% and took the shares up 64% since EU referendum day. While the fall in the value of sterling following the vote definitely made a lot of UK companies look attractive as takeover targets, the speed of this one was surprising — though I’ve been saying I think ARM shares have been undervalued for quite some time.

The bid of 1,700p per share represented a premium of 43% on the previous closing price, and today the shares stand at 1,672p — there’s still a tiny bit of uncertainty. A takeover at a P/E of 46 looks superficially attractive, but I think shareholders are selling too cheaply — and I’ll be sad to see this British success disappear from the FTSE.

The post 3 Footsie winners you should have bought since Brexit appeared first on The Motley Fool UK.

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Alan Oscroft has no position in any shares mentioned. The Motley Fool UK has recommended ARM Holdings. We Fools don't all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors.

I’ll tell you why I don’t like Mondays

Don’t get me wrong – I’m not collecting shares like others collect stamps or Elvis memorabilia.
 
Making money is the aim of the game, and so like any other investor I hope my activities will lead to a wealthier and more secure future.

Share gains are good!
 
However, I’d have preferred for ARM to stay publically listed – and for what I judge would have been the likely superior gains from it doing so to have come my way across many years.
 
You see, I believe ARM has a potentially huge addressable market in the so-called Internet of Things of the future, which could see ARM-designed chips go into many more devices than just the mobile sector it dominates today.
 
We can never know for sure – and technology is a particularly difficult sector, vulnerable to disruption from new entrants or resurgent competitors – but my personal hunch is ARM would have been trading at levels well above £17 in five or 10 years’ time.
 
ARM shares were fairly volatile, too, which might have given us more opportunities to buy in or top up at a cheaper price along the way.
 
True, ARM’s share price is now up by around 66% since ‘Brexit Day’ – mainly, I believe, because the subsequent weakening of the pound is likely to boost the value of ARM’s overseas earnings when converted back into our deflated home currency.
 
66% is a huge gain in three weeks. Perhaps I seem churlish.
 
Moreover, the multiples of ARM’s profits and sales that SoftBank is paying to gain ownership of the company seem generous.
 
But with investing it usually pays to think about the bigger picture, and while it’s academic here – small investors like you or me have no chance of influencing whether this deal goes ahead – a one-off price pop wasn’t the way I wanted to see my relationship with ARM ended.
 
This company is just too unique for that.

Not made in the UK

Now, some may feel I am being sentimental about ARM. At the end of the day, a share is a share is a share. We shouldn’t fall in love with them. They certainly won’t love us back.
 
But ARM isn’t just a share.
 
It’s a thriving business in a particular sector – technology – where there aren’t many options for UK investors.
 
True, there are some smaller firms like Imagination Technologies (LSE: IMG) and NCC Group (LSE: NCC), as well as a host of software minnows that we can invest in.
 
But ARM was our one indisputable global tech player – a way for UK investors to back a vision of the future with a large-cap share, in a similar way to when you invest in Intel or Apple.
 
On that note, many UK investors do own overseas shares, particular those of the US tech giants, either through relevant funds or directly.
 
Maybe you say having such firms listed at home doesn’t matter in an era when buying overseas shares is so much easier and cheaper than it was.
 
And it’s true – it is far easier and cheaper to own, say, US shares than 10-20 years ago.
 
But it’s still not as easy or as cheap as buying and owning UK shares. There are often extra costs and complications to think about.
 
Also, taking the bigger picture view, the loss of ARM from the public markets will also mean the average UK investor who loyally buys the FTSE 100 index will now be that bit more exposed to the sort of companies that are still heavily represented here – miners, banks, energy firms and low-growth pharmaceutical giants – and that bit less exposed to the technologies of the future. 
 
Again, some might say this is a good thing.
 
While US technology giants have made great gains and headlines over the past few years, markets are cyclical and technology shares can seem to fall from grace more easily than, say, consumer goods firms, as well as getting caught up in extremes of booms and busts.
 
Famed super-investor Warren Buffett, for instance, has steered clear of the sector most of his life. It hasn’t done his returns any harm!
 
However, in recent years even Buffett has dabbled with technology.
 
His vehicle Berkshire Hathaway has acquired a huge stake in IBM, and more recently it’s been buying Apple.
 
Perhaps this is a reflection that technology is now a mature industry – and one that even Buffett can no longer ignore?
 
If so, we UK investors now have one less way to invest in it at home.

ARM-d for the future

If the acquisition of ARM is a loss for UK investors, is it a loss for the UK economy as a whole?
 
Here, I’m less convinced.
 
SoftBank won’t be splashing out £24 billion to acquire ARM with the intention of doing anything to disrupt its new golden goose.
 
When you boil it down, the goose mainly consists of a crew of very smart and well-paid engineers, whose value is realised through a long pipeline of intellectual property that – whilst well established – requires continuous innovation to remain relevant for the long term.
 
Ultimately it’s a people business, and I believe ARM will remain a great employer of UK people.
 
SoftBank has promised as much. It says the headquarters of ARM will remain in Cambridge, and that it will at least double the UK employee headcount in the next five years.
 
I suspect ARM’s plans would have been very similar, but it’s still good to see the likely new owner making such commitments.
 
The government seems to think so, too – perhaps especially so given the uncertain environment post-Brexit.
 
Indeed, the new Chancellor of the Exchequer, Philip Hammond, quickly tweeted to say the deal proves the UK has not lost its global allure and that it remains “open for business”.

Happy Mondays

If I was Mr Hammond I’d be more cautious.
 
The reality is the Japanese Yen, like other major currencies, has soared against the UK pound in the wake of the referendum result.
 
This pound plunge has made UK assets cheaper (and UK citizens poorer) when viewed from the global stage.
 
SoftBank is striking opportunistically with a strong Yen, and it probably won’t be the last foreign company to get its hands on a prime UK business partly on account of our stricken currency.

Further opportunistic acquisitions might mean more happy Mondays to come for UK shareholders – and perhaps more positive tweets from politicians keen to put a positive spin on our economic future.
 
But if we lose more of the jewels in our market’s crown like we’re set to lose ARM, I think we investors will be the poorer for it.

The post Losing an ARM and a leg appeared first on The Motley Fool UK.

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Owain owns shares in ARM Holdings, Berkshire Hathaway and Apple. The Motley Fool UK has recommended shares in ARM Holdings and owns shares in Apple, Imagination Technologies and NCC Group.

The intention is that the acquisition will be implemented via a court-sanctioned scheme of arrangement, and ARM’s directors are unanimously recommending that shareholders vote to approve the scheme, which should happen as soon as practicable in Q3.

With the shares trading at 1,675p, as I’m writing, there’s little upside for buyers today if the deal goes ahead: a mere 1.7% including the 3.78p interim dividend holders will receive on top of the 1,700p return.

Analysts are divided on the likelihood of a counter-bid coming in. I wouldn’t buy today on the hope of such a bid, but if I already held the shares I’d be inclined to hang on just in case another suitor emerges with a higher offer.

Out with the old, in with the new

Shares of Stanley Gibbons (LSE: SGI) dived on a profit warning last autumn, and completely cratered earlier this year when it emerged that things were so dire an emergency fundraising was required.

The troubled stamps and collectibles group, whose shares had traded at 300p not much more than a year earlier, raised £13m at just 10p a share. However, following a corporate and audit update, and a boardroom clearout, announced last Friday, the shares have stormed up to 14.37p this week.

The good news is that the company has already exceeded the targeted annualised operating cost savings of £5m it set out in March and management has identified further savings. Past accounting was clearly over-aggressive, and there will be restatements and writedowns reducing net asset value. However, these won’t impact the cash position, and together with the departure of the executives who oversaw the destruction of shareholder value, a line seems to have been drawn under the inglorious past.

I like Stanley Gibbons’ new strategy of “realigning the business around predictable revenue streams, such that the company does not have to rely upon material one-off high value sales or major auction consignments to achieve profitability.” However, I believe prudent investors would be wise to wait for the company’s results and some visibility on future earnings.

Wheels up, or wheels off?

Fastjet (LSE: FJET) is another small-cap whose shares have collapsed from pounds to pence. Profit at the African budget airline has failed to get off the ground, and amid boardroom turmoil, the company was hurtling towards the end of the cash runway.

However, the shares rocketed from 23p to as high as 41p yesterday, following the announcement of a £15m fundraising. And a bizarre fundraising it was too. The price was set at 50p (a whopping 116% premium), in order — the company told us — for a number of fund managers “to satisfy their internal ownership limits”. What does that mean? Well, you’ll get a good idea if you can imagine a ‘Dragon’ on Dragon’s Den being offered, say, a 30% share in a business for £100,000, and saying: “No, but I’ll give you £100,000 for a 15% share“!

Good news though the funding is for Fastjet, potential profitability is both far off and uncertain, so, as with Stanley Gibbons, I think this is another case of ‘wait and see’.

The post Should you buy this week’s flyers ARM Holdings plc, Stanley Gibbons Group plc and Fastjet plc? appeared first on The Motley Fool UK.

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G A Chester has no position in any shares mentioned. The Motley Fool UK has recommended ARM Holdings. We Fools don't all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors.

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Owain Bennallack has no position in any shares mentioned. The Motley Fool UK has recommended ARM Holdings. We Fools don't all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors.

The deal represents a 201% return on ARM shares over the last five years, without factoring-in dividends. For shareholders who’ve held the stock for 10 years, the gain is a whopping 1,569%!

Investing in successful stocks that become bid targets can be very rewarding. While I wouldn’t suggest buying a stock simply because it might get taken over, I do think it’s worth looking for companies with the characteristics potential buyers look for.

UK #2 in chip design?

Softbank believes ARM could be a big player in the Internet of Things. Its chip designs could potentially feature in millions of newly-connected everyday devices. News of the ARM offer sent shares in Imagination Technologies Group (LSE: IMG) up by 10% on Monday morning.

The group has a similar business model to that of ARM, designing and licensing chip designs to for use in smartphones and other modern devices. But while ARM’s progress has been smooth and impressive — revenues have doubled since 2011 — Imagination’s hasn’.

Imagination is currently in the middle of a turnaround plan. Analysts are hopeful that profitability will be restored this year, but the shares already trade on 26 times 2017/18 forecast earnings. A potential bidder would have to believe they could transform a company whose profits have fallen continuously since 2012.

A valuable customer base?

TalkTalk Telecom Group (LSE: TALK) has been through the wringer over the last year, thanks to a highly-public cyber security attack.

That turned out to be less serious than expected and doesn’t concern me. I believe a potential buyer would be more interested in TalkTalk’s position as the UK’s leading budget broadband service, and its 3.9m broadband and telephone customers.

For a company such as Vodafone Group, TalkTalk could be a useful and affordable way of expanding market share in fixed-line services. An overseas player wanting to move into the UK might also be interested.

A big buyer would be able to refinance TalkTalk’s net debt of £679m at a lower cost. But if I was a shareholder it would concern me. I’d also be worried about the 6.9% forecast yield. TalkTalk’s dividend hasn’t been covered by earnings for some years, and could still be cut.

Built-in growth

Accounting software firm The Sage Group (LSE: SGE) is a company I wish I’d bought years ago. The group’s systems are integral to many company’s finance processes.

Sage’s dividend has risen by an average of almost 10% per year since 2010. An investor who paid 240p per share six years ago would now be sitting on a 180% capital gain and enjoying a 5.6% dividend yield on cost.

The group’s increasing focus on subscription services rather than packaged software sales should help to guarantee strong recurring revenues for many years to come. Unfortunately a strong share price performance means that Sage now trades on a 2016 forecast P/E of 24 and offers a forecast yield of just 2.2%.

I’m not sure the shares are good value at current levels, but this is certainly a stock I’d be happy to buy on the dips.

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Roland Head owns shares of Vodafone Group. The Motley Fool UK owns shares of Imagination Technologies. The Motley Fool UK has recommended ARM Holdings. We Fools don't all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors.

That’s approximately 43% up on the closing price of 1,189p per ARM Share on 15 July, which was the last business day prior to today’s announcement. The proposed deal values the entire existing issued and t0-be-issued share capital of ARM at approximately £24.3bn. 

Crystallising upside potential

From my point of view as an investor in ARM, this potential deal represents a good result and a satisfactory outcome to my investment. ARM’s chairman, Stuart Chambers, said: “It is the view of the Board that this is a compelling offer for ARM Shareholders, which secures the delivery of future value today and in cash. The Board of ARM is reassured that ARM will remain a very significant UK business and will continue to play a key role in the development of new technology. “

With ARM’s shares creeping up toward 1,200p again recently, perhaps investors shouldn’t be surprised to discover that something was afoot.  Back in early 2015, the shares were trading at a similar level, largely driven by takeover rumours, but at the time ARM’s board appeared to rule out the possibility of any deal, asserting that they saw ARM’s future as being an independent company.

Capturing the Internet of Things opportunity

Softbank intends to preserve the ARM organisation, its headquarters in Cambridge, its senior management and its partnership-based business model. Over the next five years, Softbank plans to double ARM’s employee headcount in the UK and to increase the number of employees abroad.

In a powerful endorsement of ARM’s strategy for growth, Sofbank asserts that the transaction will enable the combined group to capture the Internet of Things (IoT) opportunity. If there was ever any doubt in investors’ minds about the validity of all the talk about the potential of the IoT, such doubt has surely been dispelled now.

Masayoshi Son, Chairman and CEO of SoftBank said: “We have long admired ARM as a world renowned and highly respected technology company that is by some distance the market leader in its field. This investment also marks our strong commitment to the UK and the competitive advantage provided by the deep pool of science and technology talent in Cambridge. SoftBank intends to invest in ARM, support its management team, accelerate its strategy and allow it to fully realise its potential beyond what is possible as a publicly listed company.” 

Softbank intends to fund the acquisition from its existing cash resources and the ARM directors intend to recommend unanimously that ARM shareholders accept the deal.

Quality prevails

ARM Holdings has sported a rich-looking valuation for as long as I can remember. But, despite any valuation reservations investors might have had, this outcome demonstrates how quality can win through in the end.

ARM’s consistently high returns on equity, its resilient double-digit annual increases in earnings, its cash pile, its strong, entrenched trading niche in its industry and the firm’s forward-looking and innovative approach to research, development and marketing are attractive to investors of all types — including other companies.

The post ARM Holdings plc scores takeover bid from SoftBank Group appeared first on The Motley Fool UK.

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Kevin Godbold owns shares in ARM Holdings. The Motley Fool UK has recommended ARM Holdings. We Fools don't all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors.

Tech king

After trading as low as 970p on 24 June, ARM Holdings (LSE: ARM) has spiked to 1,200p, a 24% gain.  At that price ARM is trading on a current P/E ratio of 49, which falls to 33 on next year’s earnings. Is that too much to pay?

While a P/E ratio of 49 might seem high, on a relative basis it’s actually low for ARM. The tech giant has traditionally traded on high multiples thanks to its impressive growth record, with its P/E ratio climbing as high as 143 in early 2014 and averaging 59 over the last 10 years on a quarterly basis.

While analysts have concerns over slowing smartphone growth, I believe the long term growth story is still intact at ARM. The company is broadening its revenue base to focus on networking, servers and the Internet of Things and these areas should offset any weakness in smartphone chip revenues.  

ARM has grown its earnings at an annualised rate of 29% over the last five years and with the city forecasting revenue growth of 20% and 13% for the next two years, long term investors should continue to be rewarded.

Blue sky territory

Advertising giant WPP (LSE: WPP) has rebounded 13% since its post Brexit lows and is now trading in blue sky territory, having surpassed its all-time highs set in April.

As advertising companies are often seen as proxies for global growth, I wasn’t expecting to see such a rise from WPP with the current economic uncertainty surrounding the UK and Europe. However WPP has strong exposure to the US and fast growing emerging markets, and this has clearly appealed to investors.

As a WPP shareholder I’m not complaining about the stock’s recent performance as the company has been one of the better performers in my portfolio since I bought it, showing gains of almost 30% in less than a year. But would I buy more WPP shares at the current price?

Trading on a P/E ratio of 15 times next year’s earnings, WPP doesn’t look particularly expensive, however looking at the share price chart it’s clear to see that it’s prone to peaks and troughs. For this reason, I’ll be waiting for another dip in the share price before I add to my position.

Fast gains

Hikma Pharmaceuticals (LSE: HIK) has been on my watch list for a while now and I’m kicking myself that I didn’t buy a small position during the Brexit chaos as the stock has risen an incredible 38% since then.

I’m very bullish on the long-term prospects for Hikma as after acquiring Bedford Laboratories and Roxane Laboratories in the last two years, the healthcare company is poised to launch many new drugs in the near future. Furthermore, with a high proportion of its sales in the US, Hikma should benefit from weaker sterling.

However, as with WPP, I’ll be waiting for a pullback before buying-in. Patience is everything in this game and I’m sure there will be a better opportunity to buy Hikma in the future at a lower price.

The post Is it too late to buy rapid risers ARM Holdings plc, WPP plc ord 10p and Hikma Pharmaceuticals plc? appeared first on The Motley Fool UK.

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The fallout from Brexit isn’t only playing havoc with the dividend prospects of the banking segment, of course, with predicted payouts from retailers and insurers, right through to housebuilders and airlines, also coming under increased scrutiny.

With this in mind, I reckon now is the time to look at three Footsie giants whose dividend outlooks are on a far safer footing.  

ARM yourself

Chipbuilder ARM Holdings (LSE: ARM) may not be an obvious candidate for dividend seekers. After all, yields at the tech play have long lagged the FTSE 100 average. And this isn’t expected to improve any time soon — yields for 2016 and 2017 stand at 0.9% and 1.1%, based on City projections.

However, ARM’s terrific cash-generative qualities has seen it ramp up payments to its shareholders in recent times, and the business raised the dividend by a quarter last year.

And further breakneck dividend growth is anticipated as earnings balloon. Payouts are predicted to charge 19% higher this year, to 10.4p per share, and a further 21% rise is chalked-in for 2017, to 12.6p.

And I expect dividends at ARM to keep on exploding as its broad presence across a multitude of tech areas pays off.

The drugs do work

The impact of patent losses on key drugs — combined with the capital-heavy nature of drugs development — has put paid to tasty dividend growth at GlaxoSmithKline (LSE: GSK) in recent times.

Indeed, the pharma giant locked the dividend at 80p per share in 2016, and has vowed to keep payouts at this level until the end of next year (the City expects GlaxoSmithKline to make good on these projections, incidentally).

Still, investors shouldn’t forget that these projections still yield a mighty 4.8%. And with GlaxoSmithKline’s next generation of revenues drivers ready to come off the line, and medical investment the world over steadily climbing, I reckon the drugs dynamo is a great pick for those seeking market-busting yields well into the future.

Cook up a fortune

Investor appetite for the retail sector has come under pressure in recent days as the market digests the fallout of June’s Brexit vote on consumer confidence.

But I have no fears that Greggs’ (LSE: GRG) grub should stop flying off the shelves. If anything, I believe sales of the baker’s cut-price sandwiches and sausage rolls could detonate as hungry Britons switch down from more expensive food outlets.

Besides, the country’s love of a cup of tea and a slice of cake remains one of life’s constants, regardless of the state of the wider economy.

With this in mind, I reckon Greggs is a terrific bet for those seeking reliable long-term dividend growth. And I expect the caterer to make good on projected payouts of 29.5p and 33.1p for 2016 and 2017 respectively, figures that yield a handy 3.2% and 3.6%.

The post ARM Holdings plc, GlaxoSmithKline plc and Greggs plc: 3 of the safest dividends for ‘Brexit Britain’! appeared first on The Motley Fool UK.

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Royston Wild has no position in any shares mentioned. The Motley Fool UK owns shares of and has recommended GlaxoSmithKline. The Motley Fool UK has recommended ARM Holdings. We Fools don't all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors.