So if you're wondering when you're going to get paid a dividend from the different companies that
you own all you have to do is pay attention to four different dividend dates that i'm going to
explain right here and those dividend dates are issued for every single dividend out there on the
market so every single time a company declares a dividend you will have those dates available
for you for all of the different stocks and the different companies that you own because if you
just randomly go out there and buy some shares of a company just because you want to get their most
recent dividend that might not actually happen if you don't pay attention to those dividend dates
because the dates determine whether or not you qualify for the dividend and that's why you
need to pay attention to them okay so as far as the dividend dates go i want to explain this as
simple as i can but i still have to explain what they are so the first one that you're going to
run into this is called the declaration date and this is really important here because this means
that a dividend is going to be issued now what happens is the board of directors they decide
that they are going to declare a dividend they're going to tell you how much that dividend is going
to be and then they're also going to give you a few more dates that are really important as well
so now that the dividend has been declared they're also going to issue the other three dates that we
need to pay attention to here now the first one is going to be called the x dividend date think
of it just like an x now i'm going to explain more on this later because this is actually the most
important date to pay attention to but think of it just like the x or the last day that you have
to get on the books now the next date that you're going to have is called the record date
and this is always going to be one trading day after the x date
so the record you have to be on the books in order to be paid out a dividend just think of it like
that and then the last date this is the day that we actually get paid this is the payment date and
it's usually a couple weeks to a month past the x dividend date and that's usually how it occurs
now that you understand the basics of the four different dividend dates let's go back and talk
about the x dividend date because this is the number one date that you need to pay attention to
as far as knowing for sure if you're going to be issued a dividend or not now think of it like an
x like i said earlier the x date now if you don't happen to own shares of that company and you want
to get in on their most recent dividend then all you have to do is buy those shares at least
one day prior to that x date in order to be issued a dividend now if you plan on selling the shares
and you want to get that dividend then you have to sell those shares on the x date or
after and this is all you have to pay attention to because everything in the trading world takes
two business days to complete meaning they're open monday through friday not talking about a
weekend or a holiday so pay attention to those as well but as long as you're just making sure that
you give it two business days to be on record then you're good to receive those dividends
so as an example here pretend that a dividend was declared at the beginning of the month so
the first of the month and then on the 15th that happens to be the x dividend date and then on
the 16th that's going to be the record date and then on the 30th that's going to be your payment
date now if you go back to the 15th let's pretend that that's a wednesday on your ex dividend date
and they're not closed for a holiday then all you have to do is make sure that you
buy those shares on tuesday the 14th to make sure that you're on record in order to get paid
those dividends now if you already own the shares you really don't have to worry about
a thing if you're not planning on selling them but if you do plan on selling them and you want
to get that dividend then just make sure that you're doing that on the 15th on the wednesday
or later in order to be issued that dividend for that current dividend that's being paid out
now if you want to know how to find these specific dividend dates you can usually just do a simple
google search for the company and the dividend and you can find that information or you can go
to lots of different stock trading websites and different brokerages offer them as well
i happen to use nasdaq.com because i can just look up a company and then i can find their most recent
dividends and all the dates that come with it so this is just an easy way that i personally
do it but you guys can go any route that you want to so just remember that if you don't own shares
of that company that you just need to buy them one business day prior to the x date and then if
you're selling them and you want a dividend just make sure that you sell them on the x date or
later and that's all you have to pay attention to if you want to receive the most current dividend
for those shares and if you are new to investing i do have an affiliate link in the description
below for robinhood which is a really great brokerage account and they'll actually give
you one free share just for signing up with them so if you guys are interested in that it's just
down below in the description and if you just found this channel i'm jason with honest finance
and i make a lot of videos on different topics that'll give your life and your finances more
value so feel free to subscribe if you have an interest i'll leave some more investing videos
over here that you guys can watch but thank you for watching this video have a great day