ATLANTA, May 23 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- The Home Depot(R), the world's largest home improvement retailer, today announced that its board of directors declared a first quarter cash dividend of 22.5 cents per share.
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This is the 81st consecutive quarter the Company has paid a cash dividend. The dividend is payable on June 21, 2007 to shareholders of record on the close of business on June 7, 2007.
During fiscal 2006, The Home Depot returned $1.4 billion in cash to shareholders through dividends paid. The Company twice increased the dividend by 50 percent during 2006, resulting in a dividend payout ratio of approximately 24 percent. The Company also returned cash to shareholders by spending $6.7 billion to repurchase 174 million shares in fiscal 2006. Since the inception of its share repurchase program in late 2002 through fiscal 2006, the Company has repurchased 19 percent of its outstanding shares.
The Home Depot(R) is the world's largest home improvement specialty retailer, with 2,177 retail stores in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands, 10 Canadian provinces, Mexico and China. Through its HD Supply(SM) businesses, The Home Depot is also one of the largest diversified wholesale distributors in the United States, with nearly 1,000 locations in the United States and Canada offering products and services for building, improving and maintaining homes, businesses and municipal infrastructures. In fiscal 2006, The Home Depot had sales of $90.8 billion and earnings of $5.8 billion. The Company employs approximately 364,000 associates. The Home Depot's stock is traded on the New York Stock Exchange and is included in the Dow Jones industrial average and Standard & Poor's 500 index. HDE
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