Ex-Dividend

Ex-dividend is the time period between the announcement and payment of a dividend, while the date of record is the day a shareholder must officially own shares to be entitled to the dividend.

The ex-dividend date generally precedes the record date, usually by four business days on the New York Stock Exchange. But a NYSE rule allows the ex-dividend and record dates to be flip-flopped when a dividend is more than 25% of the current stock price. Why? As the ex-dividend date nears, usually a stock's price will rise by the dividend amount, then fall by that much after the date. A big dividend distribution will knock the stock price way down, but by pushing that date off, investors have a few extra days to trade the stock at the higher price.

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Dow Jones S&P 500 NASDAQ 10-Year Note
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Oil *
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DOWN
74.92
DOWN
2.86
DOWN
1.85
DOWN
0.14
10 Yr
1.74%
SPDR Gold
152.68
-0.60%
-0.22%
-0.07%
-0.80%
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