I don't know how Yahoo figures payout ratios, but Fidelity Research uses the past 4 quarters of earnings and dividends. It is a backwards looking formula, where one particularly bad quarter can skew the ratio significantly.

My best performing stock YTD has a payout ratio of 404% and a current P/E of 96. But if I look at projected future earnings using the analyst whose earnings projections have been historically close to what was actually reported, then those high numbers are much less scary.  

Choose your poison, I guess. Make your decisions based on real numbers from the past or future numbers that are always questimates. 

-dale