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* Q1 dividends slump by 25 pct, hit by one-off factors
* Dividends' underlying growth slows to 6.1 pct
* Energy sees good growth, pharmaceuticals weigh
* Capita forecasts 2013 dividend total as flat on last year
By Alistair Smout
LONDON, April 22 (Reuters) - UK corporate dividends fellsharply in the first quarter of 2013 when compared with thelarge one-off payouts seen a year ago, although underlyinggrowth was still solid, a study showed on Monday.
First-quarter dividend payouts totalled 14.1 billion pounds($21.56 billion), a drop-off of nearly a quarter from 18.8billion pounds a year earlier, research by British firm CapitaRegistrars showed.
British companies had seen eight consecutive quarters ofyear-on-year dividend growth until the first quarter of 2013.
Last year's total was aided by a total of 4.4 billion poundsin special dividends from Vodafone and Cairn Energy.
HSBC also paid its first-quarter dividend earlythis year, in December 2012, wiping another 1.2 billion poundsoff the first-quarter total, while many firms delayed paymentsinto the second quarter to take advantage of a tax cut.
With this range of one-offs taken into account, dividendssaw a much healthier underlying growth of 6.1 percent - albeitstill slower than 9.2 percent growth in the first quarter of2012.
"There is a modest slowdown in underlying dividend growthunderway, but that 6.1 percent should not be considered a poorperformance," Justin Cooper, chief executive of CapitaRegistrars, said.
"Dividends have played catch-up over the last two years, andwhile we do still expect healthy growth, it will be at levelsmore consistent with the performance in company profits."
Oil companies posted the biggest underlying year-on-yeargrowth, up 12 percent once Cairn's one-off payout last year wastaken into account.
In general, 'cyclical' companies, those more highly exposedtowards global growth trends, increased their payouts by 8.7percent - three times faster than 'defensive' stocks, which tendto offer more reliable dividends.
The worst-performing sector on an underlying basis waspharmaceuticals, which saw its combined payout fall 2.7 percentafter the value of AstraZeneca's payout, which did notincrease for the first time in a decade, was hit by weakness insterling.
However, the company's dividend yield of 5.5 percentcompared favourably to that of major energy stocks, ThomsonReuters StarMine data showed, with BP yielding 4.9percent and BG offering a 1.6 percent return.
Capita forecasts headline dividends of 80.5 billion poundsfor the whole of 2013, flat compared to last year as underlyinggrowth is set to only just offset the special payouts anddistortions of last year.
