Settlement Date

Categories: Banking, Trading

When you buy or sell a security, the transaction doesn’t close right away. Often, it takes a day for the deal to settle.

As such, there is commonly a trade date and settlement date. The trade date represents the day you made the transaction. The settlement date refers to the day the deal actually closes.

Related or Semi-related Video

Finance: What are Dividends: Declaration...15 Views

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Finance a la shmoop what are dividends? that is declaration date ex-dividend

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date pay date and record date yeah so you thought you could just invest in the [Money transfers to market for stock]

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stock pay 20 bucks a share and get to know 30 cents a share in dividends four

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times a year right? That was all you needed to know oh yeah not so easy well maybe

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it is easy but things are never so simple on the street the mean street you

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know the Wall Street when you buy a share of stock that pays a dividend a

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whole bunch of technical questions get asked and they basically all revolve [Question marks revolving around a stock]

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around whether or not you are entitled to that thirty cents and if you think

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about it dividends have been around for a long long time a whole bunch of

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schemers out there trying to kind of ripoff that dividend in nefarious ways [Person tears off dividend from stock]

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all right well why does it matter whether you're entitled to that thirty

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cents or not well with all those nefarious people out there wouldn't you

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think there are a whole bunch of sharpies they're trying to legally take [Man reading book of laws and loopholes]

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advantage of the system like you know buying that $20 a share stock the day

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before the dividend is payable holding the stock until that investor is owed

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the dividend and then just selling the stock like five minutes later it's like

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an ATM courtesy of equity stock dividend right good buy it and you sell it a [Person uses a equity stock dividends ATM]

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couple days later make free profit move on well the markets are smarter than we

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are and they adjust to that very quickly So anyway the laws have to

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be crystal clear as they apply to that process or innocent people kind of get [Man locked away in a cell]

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taken and each of the terms are on the technicals behind who gets what when in

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the land of dividends matters a lot all right first up declaration date okay

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that's the date when the board of directors publicly announces that they

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will in fact pay a dividend along with the details relating to that dividend

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like how big it will be the day you'll have to own the stock to be entitled to

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receive that dividend and also the date that the dividend will actually be paid

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all right so that's that next up the ex-dividend date and yes it [Laws appear]

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sounds like something Charles Xavier and Magneto would argue about but in fact [Charles Xavier and Magneto appear]

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it's not although that'd be a cool superhero to be like a ex-dividend

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opposed to an x-men maybe that's like a Wall Street superhero

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our lawyers are glaring at us right now the ex-dividend date is the last date

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after which shares bought in a given company don't automatically have that

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periods dividend attached so think about it like it's a Macy's white flower day [Macy's advert appears on TV screen]

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sale discount on the share you're buying if you don't buy it by say

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close of market Tuesday or whenever it is well then you don't get it that's the

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ex-dividend date you don't get that freebie dividend discount when you buy

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the share if you buy it after the close like at 4:01 p.m. on Tuesday you had to

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buy it before the market closed on that Tuesday or whenever the ex-dividend date [Man stood next to clock]

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was got it all right so all the other dates before this are called cum

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dividend or with dividend such that anyone owning this stock at that period

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has legal right to receive the dividend all right it is natural then for a $40

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stock paying say a 50 cent dividend to naturally drop 50 cents the day after

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the ex-dividend date comes into effect and in reality more or less this is what

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happens albeit with many twists and turns in the market that is the stock

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goes from 40 bucks to 39.50 a share you know the next minute so the key

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delimiter date is the record date shareholders have to register their

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ownership and yes your brokerage does that automatically usually of a given

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share of stock on or before the date of record to get that dividend and

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eventually when the dividend is finally paid magically that date is called the [Magicians stick taps stock and disappears in smoke]

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pay date yeah shocker so yeah that's a lot of dates to keep track of kind of

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reminds us of ourselves when we were in our 20s in college and had a social life

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not anymore [Group of girls sitting together]

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