Personal Finance and Money Stack Exchange
Personal Finance and Money Stack Exchange

Questions tagged [stocks]

This tag is to be used for any questions related to Stocks. Ideally they should be accompanied by a country tag if relevant. It is discouraged to ask question about a specific stock. However an example can be used to illustrate a point.

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Why should we expect stocks to go up in the long term?

I have read in many personal finance books that stocks are a great investment for the long term, because on average they go up 5-7% every year. This has been true for the last 100 years for the S&P500 index, but is there reason to believe this trend…
Bai Li
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Is it a lie that you can easily make money passively in the stock market?

People on this site often recommend that investing in an index fund is a good, passive way to make money long-term. But this is clearly not true. Even if we ignore the risk associated with investing money in stocks and only consider some sort of…
Margin
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8 answers

Theoretically, if I bought more than 50% of a company's stocks, will I own the company?

Inspired by this question, I wondered what the implications of owning the majority (> 50%) of a company's stocks are. Will I own said company? Will I be able to call the shots? What if someone was just simply rich to buy > 50%, but does not know…
Zaenille
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How can GameStop be short 140% of float?

"Short positions currently make up an impossible 140% of GameStop’s float, which is the result of a flaw in how short interest is calculated, a flaw that’s getting greatly magnified in the case of GameStop, according to Dusaniwsky." Where is the…
Kaguya Ōtsutsuki
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5 answers

If I buy 1 share of a company's stock, do I get to attend and vote at the next shareholder meeting?

Let's say I open Robinhood right now and purchase 1 share of $MSFT. Does this mean I can now attend the next shareholder meeting in Redmond (or wherever they hold them) and cast my vote? Or do I need to own a large share of the company to make it…
JonathanReez
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4 answers

Why would someone announce they are selling a large number of shares of a company?

Lukas Walton offloads stake in First Solar shares First Solar (NASDAQ:FSLR) announces secondary offering of 8.65M common shares from Lukas T. Walton, or approximately 8.2%, of the Company’s outstanding common stock. Why would Lukas Walton do this?…
Allure
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5 answers

Why are some listed companies so "cheap" in the market? What would happen if I use my money to buy 100% of its shares?

I noticed that some companies have only 100,000 market cap. And it's listed company that you can even buy its shares easily. The turnover rate is even > 100% which means it has enough liquidity. What would happen if I use my money to buy all its…
AGamePlayer
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Why does Charles Schwab have a Mandatory Settlement Period after selling stocks?

Whenever I sell stocks with Charles Schwab, I cannot access the cash for 3 days after the day I make the sale. A coworker told me that this was called a "mandatory settlement period". I was unable to determine the reason for this - is this a…
Matthew Moisen
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Can a shareholder be liable in case of bankruptcy of one of the companies he invested in?

I know it's a silly question before I ask but let's ask it anyway: Let's say that X buys 10 shares of a public company Y in the stock market. Let's also assume that Y, at some point, goes bust while X still owns the 10 shares. Can X, along with the…
nourdine
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2 answers

How can a company reduce my number of shares?

I purchased 1000 shares of ACB stock a little over a year ago. I have now learned I have only 83 shares of stock. How can the company take away over 900 shares of my stock?
Tim
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What happens if a large shareholder of a company goes bankrupt?

One of my positions continues to get beaten down by bad news. The latest is that one of its largest stakeholders might go bankrupt. My question here is what actually happens if a large stakeholder, in this case one that holds for example 49.9% of a…
Stefan Falk
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6 answers

How can we save ourselves from large drops in stock price?

After hours earning call is the perfect time for a stock price to go up or down significantly, as well as in a few minutes after the market open. The example of LinkedIn stock crashing is an example. As an individual investor, you will be late and…
wonderful world
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How are the shares rounded off when companies merge?

I had bought 100 shares of company A back in 2009. However, that company merged with company B, and they announced that I will be receiving 1 share of company B for every 8 shares held in company A. Now when I divide 100 by 8, the total is 12.5. Do…
user19894
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How can there be more people who buy stocks than people who sell stocks?

In very easy: If more people buy a stock, it climbs. If more people sell a stock, it falls. But how can that be if there must be someone buying all the stocks that are sold? Are the stocks sold back to the company?
Fabic
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Can two companies own stock in each other?

Is it possible for company A to own 20% (for example) of company B's shares, whilst company B owns, say, 20% of company A's shares as well? Edit: If So, would it be possible then for more then 50%, that is A owning B controlling stake while B also…
Ksec
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