In parts one through three of my primer course on stocks, I said that the stock of the business was the original amount of money that went into founding it. I let you know that companies divide stocks into shares, which can be bought or sold to shareholders, who are people or companies that own one or more shares of stock and therefore “share ownership” of the company. I spoke about stock brokers who are people that will charge you to arrange the purchasing or selling of stock. Now a bit buying and selling stock.
As far as financing a purchase of stock, there are two ways to do it: purchase stock with money that is currently in the buyer’s ownership, or by purchasing stock on margin. When you buy stock on margin you are purchasing stock with money that is borrowed against the stocks in the same account. In other words, you utilize the stock you already own as collateral to guarantee that you can repay your loan. Otherwise, the stockbroker can sell the collateral to repay the money it took to buy the other stock.
Selling stock works pretty much the same way as buying stock. Usually, the investor is going to want to buy low and sell high. After a broker takes out his fee for arranging the transfer of stock from a seller to a buyer, the seller is entitled to all of the money.
The price of a stock will fluctuate with the theory of supply and demand, supply being the number of shares that are offered for sale at any one moment, demand being the number of shares investors want to buy at that exact same time. When people who want to buy stock outnumber people who want to sell stock, the price will increase. Eventually, sellers will see how high the stock is being sold for and start to sell their stock, or buyers will leave and equilibrium will be achieved between buyers and sellers. When sellers outnumber buyers, the price falls. Eventually buyers come back in or sellers leave, and equilibrium is again achieved. Therefore, the value of a share of a business at any given moment is determined by all investors voting with their money.
Of course, all of this does not offer any explanation as to how people decide the maximum price at which they are willing to buy or the minimum price at which they are willing to sell, people’s buying and selling habits, or what stock will be more valuable when. People spend lifetimes trying to figure that out, it is still up for debate, and if I knew, I would not be here typing about stock, I’d be on my luxurious yacht! But I hope that my primer course on stock was at least a little enlightening.
Mallory Megan works for Rapid Recovery Solution and writes articles on medical collection agencies.