In financial markets, stock is the capital raised by a corporation or joint-stock company through the issuance and distribution of shares. A person or organization that holds at least a partial share of stock is called a shareholder. The aggregate value of a corporation's issued shares is its market capitalization.
In the United Kingdom, South Africa, and Australia, the terms stock and share(s) are used the same way, but stock can also refer to completely different financial instruments such as government bonds or, less commonly, to all kinds of marketable securities.
In the plural, stocks is often used as a synonym for shares especially in the United States, but it is less commonly used that way outside of North America.
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