It’s the best time of year, at least for seasonality. As shown in the snapshot of our Seasonality Tool below, entering October is the strongest period of the year for three-month returns, and shorter term returns are also some of the best.
Looking at dividend stocks specifically, below is a list of the 30 in the S&P 500 that have been the best Q4 performers over the last ten years.The 30 dividend stocks below have all averaged a Q4 gain of more than 11.5% over the last ten years.At the top of the list is Tapestry (TPR) with an average Q4 gain of 17.4% and positive returns 80% of the time. TPR is already having a banner year with a 30% total return, but if history is any guide, it could tack on even more through year end.
Schwab (SCHW) and Citizens Financial (CFG) rank as the second and third best dividend stocks in Q4 with average gains of more than 15% and positive returns 90% of the time.French-fry maker Lamb Weston (LW) ranks fourth followed by KeyCorp (KEY), which is the highest yielding stock on the list.Notably, Bank of America (BAC), JP Morgan (JPM), and BlackRock (BLK) rank 6th-8th, which means there are six Financials stocks in the top ten.
As you can see in the table, all but three of the dividend stocks shown are up year-to-date, with most of these names up double-digit percentage points entering Q4.It has been a strong year already for high-yielding stocks, and now they have Q4 seasonality as another tailwind.
As always, past performance is no guarantee of future results. 
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