T+1 settlement and dividend dates for the SIE

Settlement and dividend dates show up on the SIE as date-counting questions, and one rule change affects both. Everything here is as of 2026.

T+1 settlement

Settlement is the official transfer of securities to the buyer's account and cash to the seller's account. Under SEC Rule 15c6-1(a), the standard settlement cycle for most broker-dealer securities transactions is T+1: payment and delivery no later than the first business day after the trade date. It applies to trades on or after May 28, 2024. From 2017 until then the standard cycle was T+2.

Count business days only, and skip weekends and holidays:

• A Monday trade settles Tuesday.
• A regular way trade on Friday, October 16, 2026 settles Monday, October 19.
• Labor Day is Monday, September 7, 2026. A trade on Friday, September 4 settles Tuesday, September 8, because the holiday is not a business day.

Exceptions and related cycles

Rule 15c6-1 has its own carve-outs. The general T+1 requirement does not cover exempted securities, government securities, municipal securities, commercial paper, bankers' acceptances or commercial bills. The parties can also expressly agree to a different cycle at the time of the transaction. The rule also does not apply to limited partnership interests that are not listed or quoted, to security-based swaps, or to securities the SEC exempts by order.

That does not mean municipal and government securities settle slowly. T+1 for municipal and government securities comes from MSRB Rule G-15 and FINRA Rule 11320 instead. A common wrong answer says Rule 15c6-1 sets the municipal cycle. It does not.

Two more terms to keep straight:

• Cash settlement means delivery on the day of the trade (Rule 11320).
• Regulation T's payment period is the standard settlement cycle plus two business days, which is 3 business days under T+1. A customer who buys in a cash account on Tuesday, October 13, 2026 must pay in full by Friday, October 16.

Two practical points also come up. A customer selling a paper stock certificate needs it to reach the broker-dealer in time for settlement, and an ACH payment must have posted in the firm's bank account by the settlement date.

The 4:30 pm rule for firm-commitment offerings

There is a specific exception for new issues. A cash sale priced after 4:30 p.m. ET in a registered firm-commitment offering, sold by an issuer to an underwriter, may settle on the second business day (T+2) rather than the first. Where the managing underwriter and the issuer set a date for all the offered securities, that is treated as an express agreement.

So the answer to "a firm-commitment offering is priced after 4:30 p.m. ET, on what basis may it settle?" is T+2.

Dividend dates

Four dates matter, in this order: declaration date, ex-dividend date, record date, payable date. The board announces the dividend on the declaration date. The record date is the date the issuer uses to decide who is entitled to it. The ex-dividend date is the date on and after which the stock trades without the dividend. The payable date is when the company actually pays.

Here is what T+1 changed. A trade settles one business day after the trade date, so a buyer who buys the business day before the record date is on the books by the record date. That means for a normal cash dividend, the ex-dividend date falls on the same business day as the record date.

Example: the record date and ex-date are both Friday, October 16, 2026.

• Buy on Thursday, October 15: the trade settles Friday, so the buyer receives the dividend.
• Buy on Friday, October 16: the trade settles Monday, October 19, after the record date, so the seller receives it.

The Sunday record date

If the record date is not a business day, the ex-dividend date is the business day before it. Say a company sets a record date of Sunday, March 15, 2026. The ex-dividend date is Friday, March 13, 2026, and a buyer on Friday, March 13 does not receive the dividend.

Large stock dividends and splits

Stock dividends or splits of 25 percent or more work differently: the ex-date is the first business day after the payable date. Example: a 100 percent stock dividend (2-for-1) payable Friday, October 30, 2026 has an ex-date of Monday, November 2.

What the price does

All else equal, a stock's price is expected to fall by about the dividend amount on the ex-dividend date, because a buyer on or after that date does not get the dividend. The actual move can differ.

Practice

Write the calendar out: trade date, then count business days. Settlement, Regulation T and dividend questions all use the same skill. Encodr's free FINRA SIE course has date cards in unit 13 built on the same kinds of examples. For the rest of the exam, see what's on the SIE, SIE math with examples and how to study for the SIE exam. To work through bond yields on the same trades, use the bond yield calculator.