| COLLECTOR TERMINOLOGY
Until electronic trading came along, companies sold shares
of their companies to investors and gave them paper certificates
as proof of ownership. In the U.S., collectors call them stock
certificates. Collectors outside the U.S. seem to prefer the
term share certificates.
VISUAL APPEARANCE OF STOCKS
Stock ownership is normally simple, so stock certificates need
minimal text to explain ownership. Whoever owns a company’s
stock certificate owns a specific portion, or share,
of that company.
In the last few years, many major companies have stopped issuing
paper certificates in favor of electronic transactions. Paper stock
certificates are becoming extinct among large corporations.
(You can still buy paper certificates of the stock certificates
of some companies, but it will cost $50 to $75 in addition to
the cost of the underlying shares.)
 Antique
stock certificates usually measure about 11 inches wide by eight
inches tall. Size, however, varied from company to company. Some
certificates were as small as today’s paper money while others
were as large as supermarket tabloids.
With few exceptions, stock certificates were printed in horizontal
format. That means the text is printed across the wide dimension
of the paper.
The words stock and share appear on
almost all stock certificates.
Most certificates are worded similar to:
|
This is
to certify that _________________ is the owner of _______ shares of the capital stock
of the NEW YORK CENTRAL RAILROAD COMPANY... |
|
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