Do you pay dividends?

Yes, we pay out any dividends that you are eligible to receive.

• You’ll usually need to own the relative stock or instrument on or before a specified date, known as the “ex-dividend” date. This date is announced by the company usually a few weeks before the dividend payment date.
• If you purchased the stock after this date, you won’t be eligible. You’ll be able to keep track of upcoming dividend payment dates in the Lightyear app by checking the Investment Calendar (in the instrument tab).

While the dividend payment date (when the company distributes dividends) has been provided, with all dividends it can take a few business days for payments to reach the investment firm and then be forwarded to your account. Our team will forward the dividends to you as soon as we receive them from our partner. You don’t need to do anything, it will automatically be credited and you’ll receive a notification as well as a record in your activity feed and on the relevant instrument tab in the app.

Yes, we do, rounded to the nearest cent. You’ll receive the relative percentage proportionate to the amount of the share you hold, e.g if you hold 0.5 of a dividend-paying share, you’ll receive 0.5 of the dividend amount.

For personal accounts, we automatically submit a W-8BEN form on your behalf to reduce the withholding tax rate on any US dividends you receive. This applies to US stocks with the US as the payment source. You can see the applicable tax rate and the amount deducted in the dividend activity under your Transactions tab.

See more information here: Dividend taxes.

Dividends are credited to your Lightyear cash balance rather than sent directly to your bank account. If you'd like to move them, you can simply withdraw the amount to your bank account once it's been credited.

No, we don’t currently offer the Dividend Reinvestment Plan (DRIP). If you'd like to reinvest your dividends, you'll need to do so manually by placing a new order once the dividend hits your account.