Top Wall Street analysts suggest these 3 dividend stocks for enhanced returns

Dividend-paying stocks can give investors an opportunity to cushion their portfolios from market volatility — and they can also enhance returns.

Selecting the right dividend stocks is no easy feat for investors. Wall Street's best analysts have insight into companies' ability to provide attractive dividend yield and upside for the long term.

Here are three attractive dividend stocks, according to Wall Street's top pros on TipRanks, a platform that ranks analysts based on their past performance.

Consumer products giant Kimberly-Clark (KMB) is this week's first dividend pick. The owner of popular brands like Huggies and Kleenex is a dividend king, a term used for companies that have raised their dividends for at least 50 consecutive years.

In the first quarter of 2024, Kimberly-Clark returned $452 million to shareholders in the form of dividends and share repurchases. With a quarterly dividend of $1.22 per share ($4.88 on an annualized basis), KMB offers a dividend yield of 3.5%.

Earlier this month, RBC Capital analyst Nik Modi upgraded his rating for KMB stock to buy from hold and boosted the price target to $165 from $126. The upgrade followed a thorough assessment of the company following its analyst day event in March, which reflected that KMB has "shifted from a cost-focused company to a growth-oriented enterprise."

Modi thinks that KMB is well-positioned for faster and more reliable growth. He is now confident about the company achieving its long-term targets, including a gross margin of 40% and a compound annual growth rate of more than 3% (local currency) in revenue by 2030.

The analyst attributed Kimberly-Clark's transformation to the leadership of its CEO Mike Hsu. He acknowledged that the company's decision to