QNTA - $1.75 Divy! RD 25MAR2008

[BadThad]

See post here!

[Skydaemon]

Hey BT remind me about how divies work. I don't usually try to trade around them like I plan to with qnta.

Here's my assumptions, correct any that are not true if you could:

-You have to buy at least 3 market business days in advance and leave it so it has time to settle.
-Holidays don't count on the time limit. Therefore Wednesday was the last day to buy QNTA stock and have it count?
-You have to hold the stock until one day after the ex-date. So if the ex-date is march 25, you can sell the morning of the 26th and do not have to hold until the pay date.

Most important for me is when I can get out in case something happens and I see a sudden need to flee.

[BadThad]

You got it, to be safe, you needed to buy this by Mar 19th, that gives it 3 biz days to settle so you're a holder of record on March 25 (at end of day). Sometimes, depending on broker and other situations, funds settle much faster....but 3 days is SAFE. You can then sell on March 26 in the morning if you like and you'll get the divy.

Bottomline, as long as the stock doesn't drop more than 1.75 on Mar 26 when you sell....YOU'RE IN THE GREEN! This is the easiest money play one can make in the market IMO.

[Skydaemon]

Been double checking some stuff. To make a long story short, if you want this div the ex-date is apparently mar 31st after the pay date. If you sell this week you lose the div.

[BadThad]

No, that's not correct, you just need to hold thru the end of today:

The dividend will be payable in cash on March 28, 2008 to shareholders of record as of the close of business on March 25, 2008.

[Skydaemon]

I was offered a slight profit this afternoon so I took it and left, I think it will be profitable by the 31st anyway but I started feeling nervous about it and didn't feel that this was a good way to learn about how dividends work for me.

While I was searching for info I found out a few things about dividends including this link.

As of the last year nasd was replaced by finra so these are official sources I believe.

dividends greater than 25% ex-date is set as day after pay date

To make a long story short, exchanges always auto-downward adjust dividend prices by the divie on the morning of the ex-date but people normally don't notice on small div and just keep trading. With big dividends in order to tie the drop in stock price to the payment of the div so as to not create disruptions in trading, they normally set the ex-date after the pay date according to the above rule.

Note that no one has ever formally set an ex-date on qnta so I'm left to frigging guessing which I hate. This had a lot to do with my dumping this for certain green today and walking rather than playing russian roulette with the dividend rules.

So I'm saying this is the special situation of > 25% and there's a formal rule that says in this case the ex-date is the day after the pay date, so the first day you can sell is the 31st or you'll not be entitled to the div.

In the absense of any formally set ex-date this is the best info I could find.

Do you have some reason to believe that this is not the case here BT? I'm out anyway as it made me too nervous but I want to figure this out for the future.

I'm mostly posting this now so you have a shot at figuring this out for your own needs, as well as me learning what I need for the next time.

[BadThad]

You're making this too complicated, lol....you should have held the stock, this was EASY money. I'm SELLING this morning as I'm a shareholder of record as of the end of the day yesterday. I've done quite a few of these in the past...if for some bizzare reason I don't get my $$$, I'll let you know. LOL

Try reading this "from the horses mouth":

http://www.sec.gov/answers/dividen.htm

[eschberg]

I agree with BadThad.... SkyDaemon is just making this too complicated.

"The dividend will be payable in cash on March 28, 2008 to shareholders of record as of the close of business on March 25, 2008. "

http://www.pr-inside.com/quanta-anno...of-r489169.htm

[CactusPowered]

Yup, no need to complicate it. I bought 200 shares on 3/18 at 3.34, sold this morning at 3.29. That's a net profit of 1.70/share What's surprising is that so far today, this stock is holding it's own. I figured it'd tank immediately and stay down.

I don't understand why they made this dividend available, maybe it was to pay out a huge sum of money to the company execs before something happened? Honestly, I don't care WHY it happened, just that it DID, and i'm getting PAID! hehe. Thanks a ton for exposing this stock to me, bad thad.

I'll sit tight and be happy friday morning when my account goes up.

[Skydaemon]

Originally Posted by BadThad

if for some bizzare reason I don't get my $$$, I'll let you know. LOL

Yes do tell, I am actually quite interested in the outcome.

I mainly want to know 2 things.

1) Do you get the dividend.
2) Does your broker take it back before april 4th.