Doesn’t the drop in a stock price after the ex-dividend day cancel out the dividend gain for an investor?

Question

For instance, Volkswagen announced a special dividend payment of €19 in December per share. The share price dropped the next day by €19 as well. So as an investor, I didn’t gain anything (at least in the short term)? I received the dividend but my equity share is worth less that amount.

In: 3

Answer 1

Only if you sell the stock. If you don’t ever realize the loss in stock price, then you have cash in the pocket and you still have the same stock as an asset, presumably it will recover it’s value eventually.