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 CRA International, Inc. (NASDAQ:CRAI) is about to go ex-dividend in just 3 days. The ex-dividend date is one business day before a company's record date, which is the date on which the company determines which shareholders are entitled to receive a dividend. The ex-dividend date is of consequence because whenever a stock is bought or sold, the trade takes at least two business day to settle. Accordingly, CRA International investors that purchase the stock on or after the 11th of March will not receive the dividend, which will be paid on the 22nd of March.

The company's next dividend payment will be US$0.42 per share, and in the last 12 months, the company paid a total of US$1.68 per share. Based on the last year's worth of payments, CRA International has a trailing yield of 1.2% on the current stock price of US$138.09. If you buy this business for its dividend, you should have an idea of whether CRA International's dividend is reliable and sustainable. That's why we should always check whether the dividend payments appear sustainable, and if the company is growing.

Check out our latest analysis for CRA International

If a company pays out more in dividends than it earned, then the dividend might become unsustainable - hardly an ideal situation. Fortunately CRA International's payout ratio is modest, at just 27% of profit. Yet cash flows are even more important than profits for assessing a dividend, so we need to see if the company generated enough cash to pay its distribution. What's good is that dividends were well covered by free cash flow, with the company paying out 19% of its cash flow last year.

It's encouraging to see that the dividend is covered by both profit and cash flow. This generally suggests the dividend is sustainable, as long as earnings don't drop precipitously.

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. Investors love dividends, so if earnings fall and the dividend is reduced, expect a stock to be sold off heavily at the same time. For this reason, we're glad to see CRA International's earnings per share have risen 15% per annum over the last five years. Earnings per share are growing rapidly and the company is keeping more than half of its earnings within the business; an attractive combination which could suggest the company is focused on reinvesting to grow earnings further. Fast-growing businesses that are reinvesting heavily are enticing from a dividend perspective, especially since they can often increase the payout ratio later.