Member Info for Akram_

Having asked Chat GPT, it says

Prudential announced its 2025 second interim dividend with an ex-dividend date of 4 June 2026. Investors who buy the shares on or after 4 June are not entitled to that dividend, so the share price typically adjusts downward by approximately the dividend amount at the market open.

Your numbers are:

Previous close: about 1,055p

Current: about 975.6p

Drop: 79.4p (-7.53%)

A fall of roughly 79p is very close to the size you'd expect from a large dividend adjustment rather than a sudden deterioration in the business.

That doesn't mean every penny of today's decline is dividend-related—there can also be normal market moves on top—but when a stock falls by an amount similar to the dividend on its ex-dividend date, the dividend is usually the primary explanation.

A quick rule of thumb:

If you owned the shares before the ex-dividend date, you've effectively exchanged part of the share value for a forthcoming cash dividend.

If you're looking only at the share-price chart, it can look like a sharp loss even though part of the value is coming back as a dividend payment.

So based on the timing and the size of the move, today's 7.5% drop looks much more like an ex-dividend adjustment than a market panic or bad news event