The special payments of companies such as Antofagasta, Standard Life and ITV have all helped drive the level of special dividends in the first half of the year.
Chilean-based copper mining group Antofagasta, in particular, helped boost the figures, paying out a special dividend worth £502m, almost half the £1.2bn total.
But while the report recognises that the overall decline in dividend payouts in the first half of 2013 is in part down to the lack of special dividends compared with 2012, it has still “upgraded our expectation for them by £290m for the full year to a little under £2.2bn”.
Meanwhile Mr Hewson notes: “We’ve seen plenty of companies return cash to shareholders in the past year, largely down to the fact that companies probably don’t know what else to do with the surplus cash. We can largely put that down to a lack of confidence with respect to investing in new jobs and growth as a result of the recent weak economic outlook.”
But he warns this could change if the UK and European economies continue to improve.
“This partly explains the recent pick up in M&A activity as companies start to put their money to work and do deals that either improve their business models or diversify them,” he adds.
