Share capital

Share capital^[1] (or capital stock in US English) refers to the portion of a company's equity that has been obtained by trading stock to a shareholder for cash.

In its strict sense, as used in accounting, share capital comprises the nominal values of all shares issued (that is, the sum of their par values, as printed on the share certificates). If the allocation price of shares is greater than their par value, e.g. as in a rights issue, the shares are said to be sold at a premium (called share premium, additional paid-in capital or paid-in capital in excess of par). Commonly, the share capital is the total of the aforementioned nominal share capital and the premium share capital.

Sometimes shares are allocated in exchange for non-cash, most commonly when company A acquires company B for shares. Here the share capital is increased to the par value of the new shares, and the merger reserve is increased to the balance of the price of company B.

Besides its meaning in accounting, described above, "share capital" may also be used to describe the number and types of shares that compose a company's share structure. For an example of the different meanings: a company might have an "outstanding share capital" of 500,000 shares (the "structure" usage); it has received for them a total of 2 million dollars, which in the balance sheet is the "share capital" (the accounting usage).

The legal aspects of share capital are mostly dealt with in a jurisdiction's corporate law system. An example of such an issue is that when a company allocates new shares, it must do so in a way that does not inequitably dilute existing shareholders.

References

↑ Glossary on Trade Financing Terms - S Archived October 28, 2007, at the Wayback Machine.

External links

Detailed breakdown from Companies House

Financial markets

Types of markets	Primary market Secondary market Third market Fourth market

Types of stocks	Common stock Golden share Preferred stock Restricted stock Tracking stock

Share capital	Authorised capital Issued shares Shares outstanding Treasury stock

Participants	Broker-dealer Day trader Floor broker Floor trader Investor Market maker Proprietary trader Quantitative analyst Regulator Stock trader

Exchanges	Electronic communication network List of stock exchanges Opening times Multilateral trading facility Over-the-counter

Stock valuation	Alpha Arbitrage pricing theory Beta Bid–ask spread Book value Capital asset pricing model Dividend discount model Dividend yield Earnings per share Earnings yield Net asset value Security characteristic line Security market line T-model

Trading theories and strategies	Algorithmic trading Buy and hold Concentrated stock Contrarian investing Day trading Dollar cost averaging Efficient-market hypothesis Fundamental analysis Growth stock Market timing Modern portfolio theory Momentum investing Mosaic theory Pairs trade Post-modern portfolio theory Random walk hypothesis Sector rotation Style investing Swing trading Technical analysis Trend following Value investing

Related terms	Block trade Cross listing Dark liquidity Dividend Dual-listed company DuPont analysis Efficient frontier Flight-to-quality Haircut Initial public offering Margin Market anomaly Market capitalization Market depth Market manipulation Market trend Mean reversion Momentum Open outcry Public float Public offering Rally Returns-based style analysis Reverse stock split Share repurchase Short selling Slippage Speculation Stock dilution Stock market index Stock split Trade Uptick rule Volatility Voting interest Yield

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Wednesday, April 06, 2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.

Share capital

See also

References

External links