Citing its continued strong financial performance and significant cash generation, CVS Caremark boosted its quarterly 10.5%, to 7.625 cents a common share, compared with 6.9 cents, marking the sixth consecutive year of increases. Investors of record Jan. 23 will receive the new payout Feb. 3, and the ex-date is Jan. 21. Dividends have been paid since 1916. The nation's No. 1 provider of prescriptions, CVS Caremark changes hands on the Big Board around 26, close to its 52-week low. Goldman Sachs rates it Buy; S&P gives it a Strong Buy. Yield: 1.16%.

Analog chip maker Linear Technology raised its quarterly a penny, to 22 cents a share, despite a drop in fiscal second-quarter (ended Dec. 30) profit, to 38 cents from 41 cents on weak bookings. Earnings, however, were four cents better than analysts had expected. The payment, record and ex-dividend dates are Feb. 25, Feb. 13 and Feb. 11. Linear, which has sweetened dividends every year since it began paying them in 1992, trades on Nasdaq in the low 20s and yields 3.78%

Job losses, at their highest level since 1945, led to a 13% drop in fiscal second-quarter (ended Nov. 30) net at Cintas, the No. 1 name in corporate-identity uniforms. Nonetheless, the company boosted its annual dividend -- as it has every year since going public in 1983 -- to 47 cents a share from 46 cents, payable March 11 to investors on the books Feb. 4. Cintas, which boasts 39 consecutive years of sales and profit growth, credited its strong cash flow and healthy balance sheet. The Nasdaq-listed stock, recently around 24, goes ex-dividend Feb. 2. Yield: 1.99%.

Although harder to find, dividend increases are still in flower, despite the wilting economy. Take Monsanto , the world's leading producer of genetically engineered seeds. Wednesday, it sweetened its quarterly common payout 10.4%, to 26.5 cents a share from 24 cents. This is the eighth time Monsanto (MON) has raised disbursements since being spun off by Pharmacia (now part of Pfizer) in August 2002. Over that span, dividends have grown 340%. The new quarterly is payable April 24 to stockholders of record April 3. The ex-dividend date is April 1. "When farmers succeed, we succeed," said Terrell K. (Terry) Crews, Monsanto's chief financial officer. Despite plunging commodity prices, the company's high-tech, high-yield seeds keep farmers coming back. In 2009's fiscal first quarter ended Nov. 30, earnings more than doubled, to 98 cents a share from 46 cents, on a 29% jump in sales, to $2.65 billion. Wall Street's consensus estimate had been 59 cents. Monsanto raised its fiscal 2009 profit forecast to $4.40 to $4.50 a share from $4.20 to $4.40. It expects free cash flow to total about $1.8 billion.