Some investors rely on dividends for growing their wealth, and if you're one of those dividend sleuths, you might be intrigued to know that First Business Financial Services, Inc. (NASDAQ:FBIZ) is about to go ex-dividend in just 4 days. The ex-dividend date is usually set to be one business day before the record date which is the cut-off date on which you must be present on the company's books as a shareholder in order to receive the dividend. The ex-dividend date is important because any transaction on a stock needs to have been settled before the record date in order to be eligible for a dividend. In other words, investors can purchase First Business Financial Services' shares before the 7th of November in order to be eligible for the dividend, which will be paid on the 20th of November.

The company's next dividend payment will be US$0.25 per share, and in the last 12 months, the company paid a total of US$1.00 per share. Based on the last year's worth of payments, First Business Financial Services has a trailing yield of 2.3% on the current stock price of US$43.18. Dividends are a major contributor to investment returns for long term holders, but only if the dividend continues to be paid. So we need to investigate whether First Business Financial Services can afford its dividend, and if the dividend could grow.

View our latest analysis for First Business Financial Services

If a company pays out more in dividends than it earned, then the dividend might become unsustainable - hardly an ideal situation. First Business Financial Services paid out just 21% of its profit last year, which we think is conservatively low and leaves plenty of margin for unexpected circumstances.

Companies that pay out less in dividends than they earn in profits generally have more sustainable dividends. The lower the payout ratio, the more wiggle room the business has before it could be forced to cut the dividend.

Click here to see the company's payout ratio, plus analyst estimates of its future dividends.

Have Earnings And Dividends Been Growing?

Companies with consistently growing earnings per share generally make the best dividend stocks, as they usually find it easier to grow dividends per share. If business enters a downturn and the dividend is cut, the company could see its value fall precipitously. For this reason, we're glad to see First Business Financial Services's earnings per share have risen 20% per annum over the last five years.

Many investors will assess a company's dividend performance by evaluating how much the dividend payments have changed over time. First Business Financial Services has delivered an average of 9.1% per year annual increase in its dividend, based on the past 10 years of dividend payments. We're glad to see dividends rising alongside earnings over a number of years, which may be a sign the company intends to share the growth with shareholders.