If you're hoping to bag the next dividend from Westpac Banking Corp (ASX: WBC) shares, there's no time to waste. Westpac, along with the other ASX big four bank shares, is famous for its dividends. It is one of the largest and most widely-held ASX shares on the market, perhaps for this reason.
But Westpac has had some hiccups when it comes to its dividend payments in recent years. For one, it was the only ASX bank to skip a dividend entirely during the COVID crash of 2020.
But all that is in the rearview mirror now, and Westpac has been building back its dividend with a vengeance.
Its latest payout, the final dividend for FY2022, is due to hit investors' bank accounts on 20 December next month. It will be a payment worth 64 cents per share, fully franked. That represents a healthy rise from last year's final dividend of 60 cents per share, as well as the interim dividend of 61 cents per share that investors received in June.
In fact, it will be Westpac's largest post-COVID dividend since the December 2019 payment of 80 cents per share.
Want Westpac's latest dividend? Better get in quick
But if investors wish to net themselves this dividend payment, they will have to be quick. That's because Westpac is due to trade ex-dividend for this payment tomorrow. When a company goes ex-dividend, it effectively means that any new investors from that date are not eligible to receive the dividend payment in question.
This means that Westpac shares bought today will come with an entitlement to next month's dividend cheque. Those bought tomorrow will not.
So we can expect a sizeable drop in the Westpac share price tomorrow reflecting this loss of value for new investors. Shareholders will then have until 21 November to decide if they wish to participate in Westpac's dividend reinvestment plan (DRP) and receive additional shares in lieu of a cash payment.
This payment will give Westpac shares a dividend yield of 5.24% at the time of payment, based on the current (at the time of writing) Westpac share price of $23.88.
