Digital Realty vs. Equinix: Which AI Dividend Scores Higher?
Both data center REITs just paid shareholders, both ride the same AI wave, but their dividend scorecards look nothing alike. One has raised its payout for over a decade while the other has frozen shareholders out for four years despite…
Two data center REITs just paid investors, and their scorecards on payout coverage look very different. Digital Realty Trust (NYSE:DLR | DLR Price Prediction) sends shareholders $1.22 per share on September 30, 2026, the same quarterly rate it has paid since March 2022. Equinix (NASDAQ:EQIX) paid $5.16 per share on September 16, 2026, part of a raise that pushed the payout 10% higher and extended its 11th consecutive year of dividend growth. Same industry, same AI tailwind, two grades on the coverage math.
Payout Coverage: Who Has More Room to Run
Equinix guides full-year 2026 AFFO per share to $42.69 to $43.29 against expected cash dividends of roughly $2.039 billion. CFO Olivier Leonetti confirmed the target on the July call: “we have a payout ratio in the 50% range, so we will have a sizable retained cash flow.” That retained cash flow funds a capital budget of $5 billion to $6 billion for the year without stressing the dividend.
Digital Realty’s coverage is thinner on a headline basis but improving fast. FY2026 Core FFO per share guidance sits at $8.00 to $8.10 against an indicated annual dividend of $4.88, implying a payout in the low 60s. Management raised the Core FFO per share range excluding net promote income to $8.15 to $8.20 after Q2, calling it the “second consecutive year of double digit core FFO per share growth.”
Growth Streak vs. Frozen Payout
DLR’s $1.22 quarterly rate has not moved in more than four years. The company last raised the dividend from $1.16 to $1.22 with the March 2022 payment, and every declaration since has held the line. That stall now stretches across a period where Core FFO per share rose from $1.77 in Q1 2025 to $2.04 in Q1 2026. The company is earning more, but shareholders are not getting more in the mailbox.
Equinix moved the other way. The quarterly dividend stepped from $4.69 to $5.16 with the February 2026 payment, and the run of raises now spans over a decade. Management explicitly linked future increases to earnings, telling investors “dividend growth to approximate AFFO per share growth” through 2029, with AFFO per share expected to compound at 9% to 12% annually.
Balance Sheet Behind the Checks
Coverage is only as durable as the balance sheet. Equinix carries net leverage of 3.6 times adjusted EBITDA with $7.7 billion of liquidity. Digital Realty runs hotter at 4.7 times debt to adjusted EBITDA, though CFO Matt Mercier flagged that as “well below our long-term threshold” and paired it with roughly $6 billion of liquidity. DLR’s backlog reached a record $1.4 billion at DLR share, roughly 30% of in-place data center rent, which management said should support “multiple years of double-digit growth.” The capital funding that backlog has to come from somewhere, and the picks-and-shovels names on the other side of the meter, power, cooling, and networking, are the subject of a free report we put together on seven AI infrastructure suppliers that aren’t chipmakers.
Total Return Scorecard
Investors have noticed the difference. EQIX is up 36.15% year to date and 33.49% over one year. DLR trails with a 20.05% year-to-date gain and 12.45% over one year. Market caps reflect the gap: $99.4 billion for Equinix versus $67.3 billion for Digital Realty.
Grading the Coverage
On payout coverage alone, Equinix earns an A. A payout ratio in the 50% range, an 11-year growth streak, and explicit guidance tying future raises to double-digit AFFO growth is the textbook profile. Digital Realty grades a C. The FFO math works, the growth is accelerating, and leverage is dropping, but a dividend frozen for four consecutive years while earnings compound sends a mixed message about capital priorities. The next signal to watch is whether DLR’s board finally moves the $1.22 rate as 2026 Core FFO per share crosses $8.15 to $8.20. Until then, EQIX owns the scorecard.
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Chris Lange is a writer for 24/7 Wall St., based in Houston. He has covered financial markets over the past decade with an emphasis on healthcare, tech, and IPOs. During this time, he has published thousands of articles with insightful analysis across these complex fields. Currently, Lange's focus is on military and geopolitical topics. Lange's work has been quoted or mentioned in Forbes, The New York Times, Business Insider, USA Today, MSN, Yahoo, The Verge, Vice, The Intelligencer, Quartz, Nasdaq, The Motley Fool, Fox Business, International Business Times, The Street, Seeking Alpha, Barron’s, Benzinga, and many other major publications. A graduate of Southwestern University in Georgetown, Texas, Lange majored in business with a particular focus on investments. He has previous experience in the banking industry and startups.
