Dividend Reinvestment Plan. An investment plan offered by some corporations enabling shareholders to automatically reinvest cash dividends and capital gains distributions, thereby accumulating more stock without paying brokerage commissions. Many DRIPs also allow the investment of additional cash from the shareholder, known as an optional cash purchase. Unlike with a Direct Stock Purchase Plan, with a DRIP the investor must purchase the first share in the company through a brokerage. After that, the company will take whatever dividends it would normally send as a check and instead it will reinvest them to purchase more shares in the company for you, all without charging a commission. The only drawback is that the investor has no control over when his/her money from the dividends is used to purchase new stock in the company, which means he/she might be buying new shares at sub-optimal times. also called Dividend Reinvestment Program.