How to Import Dividend Data into Excel

In this post, we will discuss how to download dividend information for stocks in Excel for free.

This excel macro returns the following key metrics related to dividend.

1. Historical Dividend Data
2. Forward Annual Dividend Rate
3. Forward Annual Dividend Yield
4. 5 Year Average Dividend Yield
5. Trailing Annual Dividend Rate
6. Trailing Annual Dividend Yield
7. Payout Ratio
8. Ex-Dividend Date

1. Go to the folder where the downloaded macro file is located.
2. Right-click the file and choose Properties from the menu.
3. At the bottom of the General tab, select the Unblock checkbox under security option and then click OK.
4. Open the file and specify the start and end dates in cells B4 and B5.
5. Enter the tickers (symbols) of the stocks for which you want dividend information, starting from cell A8.
6. Press the "Get Historical Data" button to import past dividend details for each stock.
7. Press the "Summary" button to import key dividend metrics for each stock.

Historical Dividend Data

Historical data including dividends and dividend dates will be provided for the period between these dates. Please note that the end date is not included in the range.

After clicking on the Get Historical Data button, dividend data will be downloaded from yahoo finance and will appear in the "HistoricalData" sheet tab.

This macro returns dividend information for hundreds of thousands of stocks from 48 countries. It is important to follow the ticker format used by Yahoo Finance. For US stocks, you just need to specify tickers. Whereas, for non-US stocks, you need to add suffix as shown in the table below.

Example : The ticker for Volkswagen is VOW. So we need to input VOW.DE as 'DE' refers to the exchange in Germany.

Note : The macro returns NA if no data is found on Yahoo Finance.

Key Dividend Metrics

Key statistics related to dividends are downloaded from Yahoo Finance when you click on the "Summary" button in Excel.

• Forward Annual Dividend Rate : The total dividends a company is expected to pay in a year based on its current payout.
• Forward Annual Dividend Yield : The expected annual dividend divided by the current stock price in terms of percentage.
• 5 Year Average Dividend Yield : The average yield of a company's dividends over the past five years.
• Trailing Annual Dividend Rate : The total dividends a company actually paid in the past one year.
• Trailing Annual Dividend Yield : The actual annual dividends paid divided by the stock price in the past one year.

The following VBA code is used to fetch historical dividend data from Yahoo Finance into Excel.

Sub GetData()
    Dim InputControls As Worksheet
    Dim OutputData As Worksheet
    Dim symbol As String
    Dim startDate As String
    Dim endDate As String
    Dim last As Double
    Dim OffsetCounter As Double
    Dim result As Integer
    Dim rng As Range
    
    Application.ScreenUpdating = False
    Application.DisplayAlerts = False
    Application.Calculation = xlCalculationManual

    'Sheet Names
    Set InputControls = Sheets("Inputs")
    Set OutputData = Sheets("HistoricalData")
    
    With InputControls
        last = .Cells(.Rows.Count, "A").End(xlUp).Row
    End With
        
    ' Arguments
    startDate = (InputControls.Range("B4") - dateValue("January 1, 1970")) * 86400
    endDate = (InputControls.Range("B5") - dateValue("January 1, 1970")) * 86400
    period = "1d"
    
    Dateminus = -InputControls.Range("B4") + InputControls.Range("B5")
    
    If InputControls.Range("B5") > Date Then
        result = MsgBox("EndDate seems greater than today's date. Okay to you?", vbYesNo, "Validate End Date")
        If result = vbNo Then
            Exit Sub
        End If
    
    End If
    
    If Dateminus < 1 Then
        MsgBox ("Date difference must be atleast one. Since EndDate is not inclusive of the date, you can have one day difference between start and end Date to fetch latest price")
    Exit Sub
    End If
        
    
    OutputData.Range("A2:H1000000").ClearContents
    
    'Loop over multiple symbols
    For i = 8 To last
    symbol = InputControls.Range("A"& i).value
    OffsetCounter = 1
    Call ExtractData(symbol, startDate, endDate, OffsetCounter, OutputData)
    Next i

    Set rng = OutputData.Range("A:D") ' Change as needed to target specific rows
    rng.RemoveDuplicates Columns:=Array(1, 3, 4), Header:=xlYes
    
    Application.Calculation = xlCalculationAutomatic
    OutputData.Select
        
End Sub

Sub ExtractData(Symbols As String, startDate As String, endDate As String, OffsetCounter As Double, OutputData As Worksheet)
    Dim resultFromYahoo As String
    Dim objRequest As Object
    Dim tickerURL As String
    Dim combinedData As Variant
    
    ' Construct the API URL for the ticker
    tickerURL = "https://query1.finance.yahoo.com/v8/finance/chart/"& Symbols & _
        "?events=capitalGain%7Cdiv%7Csplit&formatted=true&includeAdjustedClose=true&interval=1d&period1="& startDate & _
        "&period2="& endDate
    
    ' Fetch data from the API
    Set objRequest = CreateObject("WinHttp.WinHttpRequest.5.1")
    With objRequest
        .Open "GET", tickerURL, False
        .send
        .waitForResponse
        resultFromYahoo = .responseText
    End With
        
    ' Call the ExtractDividends function to get the data
    combinedData = ExtractDividends(resultFromYahoo, Symbols)
    
    ' Check if no dividends were found
    If Not IsEmpty(combinedData) And VarType(combinedData) = vbString Then
        OutputData.Cells(OutputData.Cells(Rows.Count, 1).End(xlUp).Row + OffsetCounter, 1).value = "NA"
        OutputData.Cells(OutputData.Cells(Rows.Count, 2).End(xlUp).Row + OffsetCounter, 2).value = "NA"
        OutputData.Cells(OutputData.Cells(Rows.Count, 3).End(xlUp).Row + OffsetCounter, 3).value = "NA"
        OutputData.Cells(OutputData.Cells(Rows.Count, 4).End(xlUp).Row + OffsetCounter, 4).value = Symbols
    ElseIf IsArray(combinedData) Then
        ' Output the dividends to the sheet
        OutputData.Range("A"& OutputData.Cells(Rows.Count, 1).End(xlUp).Row + OffsetCounter).Resize(UBound(combinedData, 1), UBound(combinedData, 2)).value = combinedData
    End If
End Sub


Function ExtractValue(ByVal json As String, ByVal startTag As String, ByVal endTag As String, Optional ByVal startPos As Long = 1) As String
    Dim startPosTag As Long
    Dim endPosTag As Long
    Dim extractedValue As String

    ' Find the start position of the value
    startPosTag = InStr(startPos, json, startTag)
    
    ' If the start tag is not found, return an empty string
    If startPosTag = 0 Then
        ExtractValue = ""
        Exit Function
    End If
    
    ' Adjust startPosTag to point to the actual value
    startPosTag = startPosTag + Len(startTag)
    
    ' Find the end position of the value
    endPosTag = InStr(startPosTag, json, endTag)
    
    ' If the end tag is not found, return an empty string
    If endPosTag = 0 Then
        ExtractValue = ""
        Exit Function
    End If
    
    ' Extract the value between the start and end tags
    extractedValue = Mid(json, startPosTag, endPosTag - startPosTag)
    ExtractValue = Trim(extractedValue)
End Function

Function ExtractDividends(ByVal json As String, ByVal symbol As String) As Variant
    Dim result() As Variant
    Dim dividendsSectionStart As Long
    Dim dividendsSectionEnd As Long
    Dim position As Long
    Dim amountValue As String
    Dim dateValue As String
    Dim nColumns As Long
    Dim numEntries As Long
    Dim entryIndex As Long
    Dim currentDividendStart As Long
    Dim currentDividendEnd As Long

    ' Find the start of the "dividends" section
    dividendsSectionStart = InStr(json, """dividends"":{")
    If dividendsSectionStart = 0 Then
        ExtractDividends = "No dividends found."
        Exit Function
    End If

    ' Find the end of the "dividends" section
    dividendsSectionEnd = InStr(dividendsSectionStart, json, "}}")
    If dividendsSectionEnd = 0 Then
        ExtractDividends = "No dividends found."
        Exit Function
    End If

    position = dividendsSectionStart
    entryIndex = 1
    numEntries = 0

    ' Count the number of entries
    Do
        currentDividendStart = InStr(position, json, "{") ' Move to the next opening brace
        If currentDividendStart = 0 Or currentDividendStart >= dividendsSectionEnd Then Exit Do
        numEntries = numEntries + 1
        position = InStr(currentDividendStart + 1, json, "{") ' Move to the next opening brace for the next entry
    Loop

    ' Redimension the array to store the results (3 columns: date, amount, symbol)
    nColumns = 4
    ReDim result(1 To numEntries, 1 To nColumns)

    ' Reset position to extract data
    position = dividendsSectionStart

    ' Loop through each dividend entry
    For entryIndex = 1 To numEntries
        ' Find the next opening brace for the current entry
        currentDividendStart = InStr(position, json, "{")
        If currentDividendStart = 0 Or currentDividendStart >= dividendsSectionEnd Then Exit For

        ' Extract the date value
        position = InStr(currentDividendStart, json, """date"":") ' Find the date key
        If position = 0 Or position >= dividendsSectionEnd Then Exit For
        dateValue = ExtractValue(json, """date"":", "}", position)

        ' Extract the amount value
        position = InStr(currentDividendStart, json, """amount"":") ' Find the amount key
        If position = 0 Or position >= dividendsSectionEnd Then Exit For
        amountValue = ExtractValue(json, """amount"":", ",", position)

        ' Store the date, amount, and symbol in the result array
        result(entryIndex, 1) = Format(CDate(CDbl(dateValue) / 86400 + DateSerial(1970, 1, 1)), "yyyy-mm-dd")
        result(entryIndex, 2) = amountValue
        result(entryIndex, 3) = ExtractValue(json, """currency"":""", """")
        result(entryIndex, 4) = symbol ' Add the symbol to the third column

        ' Move position to the next entry for the next loop
        position = InStr(currentDividendStart + 1, json, "{") ' Move to the next opening brace for the next loop
    Next entryIndex

    ExtractDividends = result
End Function