How to Cash in Your Stocks
Billions of shares of stock are traded every day. How you cash in your stocks depends on where the actual stock certificates are located. They could be held at the brokerage firm where you conduct business, the corporation where you work, the online trading company you use, a direct purchase program, or possibly in a cardboard box you just found in your attic. Wherever your stocks reside, there will be a transaction cost to sell them.
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Instructions
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Contact your broker to sell stock shares that exist in your trading account. Discuss your investment goals relative to the sale and decide what type of order you will place. To maximize profits, consider whether selling the stock immediately in a market order will be a better strategy than using limit or stop orders that sell the stock at a later date at a price you set that is higher than the current market.
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Contact the investment manager at the corporation where you work to find out how to sell your stock shares. Companies will have rules and regulations regarding the timing of sales relative to when the stock was earned or purchased. Some companies buy and sell shares at specific times and the shares are traded at an average market price.
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Find the website where you conduct your online trading or the direct purchase plan where you have purchased stock online and find out how sales are executed. The mechanics of selling stock positions may vary slightly by site, but most sales of stock involve just a few clicks.
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Locate the signature on the stock certificate you just found in your attic. If it is your name, then you can sign the certificate and mail it to your broker to sell. If it is not your name, you can still sell the stock through your broker, or you can use a transfer agent. This is the financial institution that handles the corporation's stock and its name will be on the certificate. The transfer agent will send you paperwork to transfer the stock to your name. Set up an account, and sell the stock.
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References
- Photo Credit Sell image by robootb from Fotolia.com
