Korea Dividend Record Date Reform: Why Ex-Dividend Dates Moved

Korean listed companies can now announce a dividend first and decide afterward which shareholders receive it. The change began with a plan that the Financial Services Commission (FSC), the country's financial regulator, and the Ministry of Justice announced on Jan. 31, 2023. For foreign investors, it means the ex-dividend date of many Korean stocks no longer falls in late December.

Under the old practice, most companies fixed the list of shareholders entitled to a year-end dividend on Dec. 31 and set the amount at a shareholders' meeting the following March. As a result, "investors invest in companies without knowing how much they will receive in dividends," the FSC said. Foreign investors such as global dividend fund managers called dividend investing in Korea "investing with blind faith," according to the regulator.

The sums are large. Dividend payouts by companies on the KOSPI, the Korea Exchange's main market, reached an all-time high of 35.1 trillion won ($23.8 billion) in 2025. The figure comes from exchange data reported by Yonhap in the Korea JoongAng Daily on April 20, 2026.

Here's what you need to know.

What Changed in Korea's Dividend Record Date Rules?

The record date is the day a company uses to fix, from its shareholder register, who receives a dividend. Korea's Commercial Act already treats the right to vote at a shareholders' meeting and the right to receive a dividend separately. Even so, most companies used the end of December as the record date for both.

On Jan. 31, 2023, the FSC and the Ministry of Justice issued an authoritative interpretation of Article 354 of the Commercial Act. It confirmed that a company may set a dividend record date separate from its voting record date. It also confirmed that the dividend record date may come after the shareholders' meeting that approves the payout.

The ministry's interpretation, attached to the FSC's Korean-language release, says this is lawful if no more than three months pass between the record date and the day shareholders can collect the dividend. Article 354 also requires a company to announce a record date at least two weeks in advance, unless the date is written into its articles of incorporation.

To use the new order, a company had to amend its articles of incorporation, the company's charter. Under the FSC's plan, the Korea Listed Companies Association and the KOSDAQ Association were to publish revised model articles in February 2023. Companies could then vote on the change at shareholder meetings around March 2023 and apply it as early as 2024, to dividends for fiscal 2023.

The old calendar had drawn criticism abroad. The FSC's Korean-language release quoted MSCI's Global Market Accessibility Review of June 2022: "Korean companies disclose dividend amounts after the ex-date of the dividends, which is different from international standards."

The regulator also pointed to share prices. A stock went ex-dividend at the end of December, before the amount was set, so the March decision came too late to be reflected properly in the price, the FSC said.

KB Financial Group shows the new pattern. Its year-end record dates were Feb. 29, 2024, Feb. 28, 2025 and Feb. 27, 2026, each followed by a March shareholders' meeting, its business report shows. The table compares the two calendars.

How Did the Rules Change for Quarterly Dividends?

Quarterly dividends needed a change in the law itself. Article 165-12 of the Financial Investment Services and Capital Markets Act, the main securities law, set the record dates for listed companies' quarterly dividends at the end of March, June and September. The board then fixed the amount within 45 days.

The FSC had planned to introduce a bill in the first half of 2023, but the National Assembly passed the amendment only on Dec. 27, 2024. It was promulgated on Jan. 21, 2025, as Act No. 20718. The FSC said the quarterly dividend changes would take effect on the day of promulgation, while the bill's disclosure changes would follow six months later.

The amended article drops the quarter-end record dates. The board still decides the amount within 45 days of the quarter's end, and investors then have until a later record date to make up their minds, the FSC said. Payment is due within one month of the board's decision, up from 20 days, unless the articles or the board set another period.

Companies again had to change their articles. KB Financial Group's shareholders did so on March 26, 2025. Its quarterly record dates then moved from March 31, June 30 and Sept. 30 in 2024 to May 12, Aug. 11 and Nov. 14 in 2025, according to its business report.

Shinhan Financial Group, whose shareholders approved a similar change on March 26, 2025, set its 2025 quarterly record dates in advance and decides each amount before them. Its board approved the first-quarter dividend on April 25, 2025, ahead of a May 2 record date, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

Not every company has switched. Samsung Electronics used Sept. 30, the last day of the quarter, as the record date for its third-quarter 2026 dividend, Seoul Economic Daily reported on Oct. 30, 2026.

How Many Korean Companies Use the New Dividend Calendar?

Adoption has come in steps, because each company has to change its own articles. By early December 2023, 636 of the 2,267 listed companies with a December fiscal year, or 28.1%, had done so. The figure came from the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS), the market watchdog, according to the Asia Business Daily.

By December 2024, the count was 1,008 companies on the KOSPI and the KOSDAQ, Korea's two main stock markets, or about 42%, the FSC said on Dec. 27, 2024. Having the option was not the same as using it. Of 321 such companies that paid a dividend for fiscal 2023, 109, or about 34%, actually set the record date after the amount, the FSC said.

By the end of March 2025, 1,137 companies had made the change, 422 on the KOSPI and 715 on the KOSDAQ. That was 46.6% of the 2,440 listed companies with a December year-end. The count comes from the KOSDAQ Association and the Korea Listed Companies Association, as reported by the Asia Business Daily on May 22, 2025.

In December 2025, about 70 companies announced on DART, the FSS's electronic disclosure system, that their amended articles let the board set the year-end record date in place of Dec. 31. Of those, 59 were on the KOSPI and 12 on the KOSDAQ, Seoul Economic Daily reported on Dec. 15, 2025. It named LG Chem, POSCO Holdings, DL E&C, KB Financial Group and Mirae Asset Securities among them.

Regulators have also made companies say where they stand. Under FSC guidelines announced on Oct. 19, 2023, corporate governance reports submitted from 2024 must state whether a company has improved its dividend procedure, to "ensure that investors know the dividend amount before making investment decisions." In December 2024, the FSS said business reports would also have to state whether a company has adopted the new procedure, the Asia Business Daily reported.

How Do You Find a Korean Stock's Record Date and Ex-Dividend Date?

The dates are in the company's filings on DART, at dart.fss.or.kr. English DART, at englishdart.fss.or.kr, lists some of them in English, such as HS Hyosung's "Decision on Cash Dividends and Dividends in Kind" of Feb. 26, 2025. Look for three things:

• A notice that Dec. 31 no longer counts. POSCO Holdings told shareholders in December 2025 that "being listed on the Company’s registry of shareholders as of the last day of FY2025 does not grant entitlement to year-end dividends." It said the record date would be set at a board meeting in February 2026.
• The board's dividend decision. KB Financial Group's filing of Feb. 5, 2025, gave both pieces: its board declared the year-end dividend that day, and the filing named Feb. 28, 2025, as the record date. Woori Financial Group's board set the same record date on Feb. 7, 2025.
• The lookup pages. The FSS has said investors can check listed companies' record dates and dividend amounts on the websites of the Korea Exchange, the Korea Listed Companies Association and the KOSDAQ Association, the Asia Business Daily reported on Feb. 16, 2025.

Next, work out the last day to buy. Korean share trades normally settle on the second business day after the purchase, a cycle known as T+2. Money Today set out the rule on Dec. 22, 2025, in a report on a notice from the Korea Securities Depository (KSD).

When the record date is a trading day, the last day to buy is two trading days before it, the Asia Business Daily explained on Feb. 28, 2024. The next trading day, just before the record date, is the ex-dividend date: a buyer on that day or later does not receive the dividend.

When the record date falls on a market holiday, count back from the last trading day. In 2025, Dec. 31 was a holiday and Dec. 30 the last trading day. The KSD said investors had to buy by Dec. 26, and the Korea Exchange set Dec. 29 as the ex-dividend date for companies with a December record date.

Simply put, the record date decides who gets paid, but the deadline for a trade comes two trading days earlier, and from the ex-dividend date the shares trade without that dividend.

For how foreign individuals reach the market in the first place, see our guide to buying Korean stocks from abroad.

What Should Foreign Investors Watch?

Two calendars side by side. Samsung Electronics has typically used Dec. 31 as its year-end record date, Seoul Economic Daily reported on Oct. 30, 2026. If it does so again, the last day to buy for its 2026 year-end dividend is Monday, Dec. 28, 2026, and Tuesday, Dec. 29 is the ex-dividend date, the paper said, adding that the date will need final confirmation around December.

Voting and dividends can split. A company can keep Dec. 31 as its record date for voting. POSCO Holdings said its voting record date "remains the same as December 31 as stated in the Articles of Incorporation." An investor who held shares on Dec. 31 and sold in January could vote at the March meeting without receiving the dividend, while a buyer who holds the shares on the later dividend record date could receive the dividend without a vote.

A choice made every year. Changing the articles creates an option, not an obligation, so each season's notice and dividend filing is the guide, not the date a company used before.

Payouts, not just dates. Seeing the amount early is not the same as a higher payout. Korea's payout ratio, the share of net profit paid as dividends, was 20.1% in 2022, against 40.5% in the U.S., according to Bloomberg data cited by the FSC. Kim Jong-young, a researcher at NH Investment & Securities, noted that "payout ratios fluctuate more with changes in net profit than with dividend amounts," as translated by Seoul Economic Daily.

Together, the 2023 interpretation and the January 2025 amendment let Korean companies announce a dividend before the record date, so each company's filings, not the calendar, now show which date decides who gets paid.