When you invest in stocks, you actually buy shares of stock.  So what is a share of stock anyway?

Let’s think about a pizza pie.  And lets say you and your friends all chip in and buy a pie together.  So you will all share slices of the pizza pie.  I just said the word “share,” didn’t I.

So you cut the pie into slices.  And you share the slices with your friends.  They each got their shares of slices and you get  your share.

Now let’s say you and your friends want to buy a business together.  Maybe a nice wine shop to go with the pizza.  So you will all share the business.

You cut (divide) the ownership of the business into slices (shares).  And you share the ownership (slices, shares) with your friends.  They each get their share and you get your share.

That’s all a share of stock is.  It’s your slice (share) of the business.  It’s your share of the ownership.  It’s your share of the profits.  It’s your share.

Corporations slice their ownership up into shares also.  Anyone can buy a share.  Or you can buy more than one share.

Just like our pizza example — let’s say it cost you $10 and you cut it into 10 slices. That’s $1.00 a slice. If you were really hungry, you could have chipped in $2.00 so you would get two slices.  So you bought two shares.

Of course corporations are a lot bigger than a $10 pizza pie.  So they cut the ownership into millions of shares.

You can buy more than one share.  You can buy 12 shares, or 100 shares, or a 1000 shares.  You can buy as many shares as you want and can afford.

But it is exactly the same idea as your 10 shares of pizza pie.  You are buying your slice(s) of the corporate pie.  You are buying your share(s).