Dividend stocks have soared like eagles over the past five years, but they appear to be coming back down to earth.

In recent weeks, investors have been dumping some of their dividend-stock holdings. The stocks look a bit less attractive now that the 10-year Treasury yield has surpassed the average dividend yield paid by Standard & Poor's 500 Index stocks, as CNNMoney reports.

The 10-year yield hit a 13-month high of 2.23 percent Wednesday and stood at 2.135 percent late Friday. Meanwhile, the S&P's average dividend yield offers only 1.98 percent.

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Ascending bond yields have pushed investors out of dividend-paying sectors such as utilities, telecommunications firms and real estate investment trusts, according to CNNMoney.

"All of the safe-haven sectors have been underperforming," David Lutz, head ETF trader at Stifel Nicolaus, told the news service. "The defensive stocks have been overwhelmed by the rotation away from yield."

Some investors are shifting to riskier growth stocks, says J.J. Kinahan, chief derivatives strategist at TD Ameritrade. "Investors had been chasing yield, now they are chasing capital gains," he told CNNMoney.

To be sure, some experts say the pullback in dividend stocks may prove to be fleeting.

"Dividend stocks in the last few days have been taking a beating, which has been expected.
We've been waiting for this," Howard Silverblatt, senior index analyst at S&P Capital IQ, told CNBC.

"But dividend stocks are up for the long term."

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