subject: Stocks For Beginners Part Two [print this page] In part one of my primer course on stocks, I let you know that businesses divide stocks into shares, and that each share represents a fraction of ownership. I told you that shares may come with different ownership rules, privileges, or share values. I also told you about the two forms of stock: common stock and preferred stock. Now we'll talk about shareholders.
A shareholder is a company or person that legally owns one or more shares of stock in a joint stock company. Shareholders get special privileges that depend on the type of the stock. Privileges can differ and include: the right to vote on matters like elections to the board of directors, the right to share in distributions of the company's income, the right to buy new shares that are issued by the company, and the right to a company's assets when a company liquidates. Directors and officers of a company are bound by fiduciary duties to act in the shareholders' best interests.
Owners of a company may sell shares to build additional capital for investing in new projects within the company, or to reduce their holding so they have more capital freed for their own private use. When you purchase a share you are literally sharing in the ownership of the company, a portion of the decision making power, and potentially, a portion of the profits.
Because at any given time there could potentially be thousands of shareholders in a publicly traded, large corporation, shareholders will use their shares in the form of votes in the election of members of the board of directors of the business.
Usually, each share equals one vote. Corporations might issue different classes of shares though, which might have different voting rights. Because shares are proportional to votes, owning most of the shares permits other shareholders to be out voted, which is how original owners of a large business will usually still have control of the company. To Be Continued In Part Three.
