DEFINITION of XD
XD is a symbol to indicate that a security is trading ex-dividend.
WHAT IT IS IN ESSENCE
The ex-dividend date is the day on which all shares bought and sold no longer come attached with the right to receive the most recently declared dividend. When a company declares a dividend, it sets a record date when you must be on the company’s books as a shareholder to receive the dividend. Once the company sets the record date, the stock exchanges fix the ex-dividend date.
The ex-dividend date is normally two business days before the record date. If you purchase a stock on or after its ex-dividend date, you will not receive the next dividend payment. Instead, the seller gets the dividend. If you purchase before the ex-dividend date, you will get the dividend.
Hence the stock’s price is expected to be lower.
If a dividend is 25% or more of the stock’s value, then special rules will employ to arrange the ex-dividend date. When this occurs, the ex-dividend date is delayed until one business day after the dividend is paid.
HOW TO USE
For example, if you buy a stock before it goes XD, then you will receive the next upcoming dividend payment.
If you purchase the stock after it goes XD, you will not receive the dividend.
With a large dividend, the price of a stock may move up by the dollar amount of the dividend as the ex-dividend date approaches and then fall by that amount after the ex-dividend date.
XD first displays for a security from the morning of the ex-dividend date (generally one business day before the record date) and remains until the close of trading on the date payable. Trading in securities displaying XD on ASX Trade does not carry the entitlement to the dividend payment. For more information refer to the description of cum dividend. All orders are purged at the end of the trading day prior to the security being quoted on an XD basis.