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Adjusted close

An adjusted closing price is a vendor-calculated historical price that attempts to account for specified corporate actions, commonly stock splits and sometimes cash distributions.

By Betta Signals Research Desk · Reviewed October 24, 2026

Plain-English definition: An adjusted closing price is a vendor-calculated historical price that attempts to account for specified corporate actions, commonly stock splits and sometimes cash distributions.[1]

How the term is used

Yahoo documents its adjusted close as accounting for splits and dividend distributions. That describes Yahoo's field, not a universal standard, so another provider's methodology still needs to be checked.[1]

What to check before relying on it

Do not treat adjusted close as a universal total-return series. Check the provider's method, compare split and distribution records separately, and record whether cash distributions were reinvested.

Example

After a 2-for-1 split, an unadjusted pre-split close may look twice as high as a later close. A split-adjusted series rescales the earlier observation so the split itself does not appear as an economic loss.

Corporate actionStock splitTotal return

Research last reviewed: October 24, 2026. This definition is educational and does not evaluate a particular security.

Sources

  1. Yahoo Help: What is the adjusted close? — a provider-specific explanation of how one widely used historical-data service adjusts closing prices. Accessed October 24, 2026.