You bought before the dividend and got nothing 📅
You buy a dividend stock on Monday. The dividend pays Friday. You get nothing, and you assume something went wrong.
Nothing went wrong. You bought on the wrong side of one date.
Four dates run every dividend. Only one of them decides whether the money is yours.
1. Declaration date. The company announces it's paying, how much, and when.
2. Ex dividend date. This is the one that matters. Buy on or after it and the dividend belongs to the seller, not you.
3. Record date. The company checks its books to see who actually owns the shares.
4. Payment date. Cash lands. Often weeks later.
This is what catches people who learned the rule years ago. The ex date used to sit one business day before the record date. US settlement went from two days to one on May 28 2024, and the ex date moved onto the record date itself. So the old "buy the day before the record date" shortcut is now wrong, and it quietly costs people the exact payout they were buying for.
One caveat, because none of this is free money. On the ex date the stock typically opens lower by roughly the dividend, since the company just committed to handing that cash out. Buying the day before to grab a payout isn't a strategy. It's a wash with a tax bill attached.
Worth knowing so the date doesn't surprise you. Not so you can game it.
Educational, not financial advice. Just my read.
