Coca-Cola and Walmart Lead Barchart’s Screen for Low-Volatility Dividend Aristocrats

Dividend Aristocrats are widely viewed as steady income producers, meaning S&P 500 companies that have raised dividends for at least 25 consecutive years. In a new column dated June 5, Barchart said it screened for Dividend Aristocrats with lower volatility, using a 60-month beta range of 0.00 to 1.00, a “Strong Buy” style analyst rating filter, and minimum analyst coverage, then ordered the results by beta. The outcome was four names, with Coca-Cola and Walmart at the top of the list by lowest-to-higher long-term market movement. (Barchart later described the fourth pick as a “weekend bonus,” but still included it in the screened set.)

Coca-Cola, ticker KO, was No. 1 in the screen. Barchart described the company as a global beverage business in more than 200 countries and cited Coca-Cola’s 64th consecutive annual dividend increase. In its own February 19, 2026 announcement, Coca-Cola said it raised the quarterly dividend from 51 cents to 53 cents, which it said equates to an annual dividend of $2.12 per share. Barchart added that KO’s forward annual dividend was $2.12 at the time of publication, implying a yield around 2.75%, and that KO’s 60-month beta was 0.35, the lowest on the list. The column also said analysts rated the stock “Strong Buy” with a consensus of 23 analysts.

Barchart ranked Walmart as the second-lowest beta name among its screened Dividend Aristocrats, putting WMT next after Coca-Cola. The column said Walmart had 53 years of consecutive dividend increases and cited an annual payout of $0.99, implying a yield around 0.8% when the article was published. It also claimed WMT’s 60-month beta was 0.59 and that the stock carried a “Strong Buy” consensus rating from 38 analysts. While Barchart framed Walmart as a Dividend King with a focus on stability, Walmart’s recent earnings release also reflected an ongoing dividend increase, with the company stating it increased its annual dividend to $0.99 per share.

The other two names in Barchart’s four-stock screen were Cardinal Health (CAH) and Linde plc (LIN). Barchart characterized Cardinal Health as a healthcare distributor and said it had raised dividends for nearly 40 consecutive years, while Linde, an industrial gases and engineering company, was described as having raised dividends for 33 consecutive years. For both, the column included beta figures and “Strong Buy” analyst consensus ranges, but the article’s primary emphasis remained on income consistency and relatively subdued historical price movement versus the broader market.

The underlying logic of the screen is that dividend continuity plus lower long-term beta can offer a different profile than chasing the highest-yield or fastest-growth dividend stocks. Beta, short for “market beta,” is a measure of how much a stock has moved relative to the overall market over a set period, and Barchart used a five-year window to approximate volatility. Combined with analyst-rating filters and minimum coverage, the approach attempts to narrow the field to names that have both a dividend track record and market-behavior characteristics that have historically been more defensive.

Still, investors should note what the column does not fully quantify. The Barchart post relies on screen inputs (beta, analyst ratings, and coverage) but does not provide a detailed assessment of dividend affordability using metrics such as payout ratios, free cash flow coverage, or scenario stress tests. It also does not show how sensitive the results are to the exact filter cutoffs, and the implied yields reflect conditions at the time of publication rather than forward cash-return estimates.

What to watch next is whether these low-beta dividend candidates keep matching the underlying thesis if market conditions shift. For Coca-Cola, the most recent dividend action was a quarterly increase to 53 cents and an annualized rate of $2.12, as disclosed by the company in February 2026. For Walmart, the most recently disclosed annual dividend rate was $0.99 per share in its February 19, 2026 earnings release. Longer-term confirmation will depend on continued dividend discipline and whether their historical beta profiles remain stable going forward.