The S&P/ASX 200 Index (ASX: XJO) is basking in some robust gains as it currently stands this Wednesday. At the time of writing, the ASX 200 is up by a healthy 0.45% at just under 7,380 points. The best performing sector is currently tech shares. So it might come as a surprise to see that the Seek Limited (ASX: SEK) share price is in the red today.
Yes, Seek shares are currently being priced at $30.39. That's down by a hefty 1.56%. So why such a marked underperformance from one of the older tech shares on the ASX 200?
Well, today's drop is likely stemming from one of the better reasons to have a share fall in value. Today is the day that Seek has traded ex-dividend for its upcoming shareholder dividend payment. Back when Seek delivered its half-year earnings report in February, it declared an interim dividend of 23 cents per share, fully franked. That was a healthy increase on last year's 20 cents per share final dividend.
So the reason why there is some selling pressure on Seek shares today is because today is the company's ex-dividend date. When a company trades ex-dividend for an upcoming payment, it means that new investors are cut off from receiving this divided. As such, the value of the dividend is no longer available, and thus leaves the Seek share price.
Seek investors can look forward to receiving their interim dividend on 7 April.
Seek share price snapshot
Despite today's share price falls, Seek shares remain up around 10% over the past month. However, this online classifieds company has been suffering in 2022 so far. It's still down just over 10.5% year to date. However, it remains up by 9.95% over the past 12 months, and up 94% over the past 5 years.
At the current Seek share price, this ASX 200 share has a market capitalisation of $10.93 billion, with a dividend yield of 1.42%.
