How to Read a Streaming Stock Quote (5 Steps)

Find the stock symbols of the company or companies you want to follow through any of the following websites: MSN money central, investors.com, finance.yahoo.com or market watch. Look for the 'Symbol Lookup' field and type in the company you are looking for. The symbol will be one to four capital letters long. It is the first piece of information given for each company in its streaming quote.
Read the stock numbers. The stock numbers will follow the stock symbols. The number is abbreviated with the letter 'K' standing for 1,000, 'M' standing for 1,000,000 and 'B' standing for 1,000,000,000. If you see 30K, this means that 30,000 shares of stock have been traded for that company.
Read the prices traded. This is the second piece of information behind your stock symbol, it shows the bid price, or what each share is going for at the current time. This number is given as a whole number and decimal. 186.50 means $186.50
Note the change of direction. The third thing to look at after your symbol is the direction change. This will tell you whether the stock has gone up or down since the previous day's trading. This symbol is an arrow head that is either pointing up or down. There are some tickers in the media that will use a plus or minus sign instead of an arrow head. You will also be able to tell this information by the color code given. A green color means up, and red means down. So a green arrow or plus sign means the stock's price has increased.
Read the amount that the stock price has changed. This is a number that indicates the specific change in price and is the final piece of information to read. Often, it will be green if it is an increase and red if it is a decrease. The color code system helps you to instantly visualize whether your stock has gone up or down. This number will be given as a percentage, 2.64%, of the previous trading price.

How to Record Stock Options on a Balance Sheet

Record the periodic cost allocation of the stock option. The periodic cost is the value of the stock options divided by the number of service years. Record a journal entry that debits 'compensation expense' (this expense is reported in the income statement) and credits 'additional paid in capital -- stock options' (a stockholder's equity account reported in the balance sheet). Record this cost annually throughout the employee's vesting period.
Record the exercise of the stock option. When the exercise date arrives, the employee can exercise the option and purchase the company's common stock at the exercise price. Common stock is valued at par, a designated dollar amount used to value each share of common stock on the balance sheet. When common stock is sold or repurchased, it is usually for a price above the par value, so the excess amount over par is credited to an 'additional paid in capital' account. The journal entry to record the exercise of the option involves debiting 'cash' for the number of shares purchased multiplied by the exercise price. In addition, debit 'additional paid in capital -- stock options' for the balance accumulated in the account over the vesting period and credit 'common stock' for the number of shares purchased multiplied by the stock's par value. The remaining credit is made to 'additional paid-in capital in excess of par (common stock)' for the amount needed to balance the journal entry.
Record the expiration of the options, if applicable. If a stock option is not exercised on its exercise date, it will expire or sometimes only some of the shares offered by the option are purchased. If the options expire, the balance in the 'additional paid in capital -- stock options' account needs to be transferred to 'additional paid in capital -- expired stock options' account. By debiting the stock options account and crediting the expired stock options account, the cost is reclassified within the stockholder's equity section of the balance sheet. When a portion of the option shares are exercised and a portion expire, allocate the costs as explained in steps 2 and 3 based on the number of shares purchased and the remaining value of the option that expired.

How to Report Stock Options Taxes (8 Steps)

Review your brokerage earnings statement for the tax year (and previous tax years if necessary) and group together purchase dates and prices with the appropriate selling dates and prices.
Calculate and determine which options were short-term assets and which were long-term assets. Any option that was held for over a year is considered a long-term capital gain or loss.
Enter into line 1 of the 'Part I' Section of Schedule D the first short-term stock option transaction that was completed for the tax year. Options that are presently held will be reported in a future tax year. The description (column A) of the option must include the company name, the quantity of options traded, the type of option (Call or Put) and the expiration date (i.e. Dec 2009).
Enter into columns (B) and (C) the dates the option was purchased and sold, respectively. Notice that if the transaction was a short sale of the option, the sold date would precede the purchase date.
Enter into column (D) and (E) the sales price and the cost of the options, respectively. Ensure that commissions and exchange fees are included in these prices.
Calculate the gain or loss from the option transaction by subtracting the option cost (column E) from the sales price (column D) and enter the gain or loss into column (F).
Continue entering all the short-term option transactions that were completed during the tax year as described in the previous steps. If necessary, use Schedule D-1 (continuation sheet for Schedule D) to report all the transactions.
Enter into line 8 of the 'Part II' Section of Schedule D the first long-term stock option transaction that was completed for the tax year. Continue entering all the long-term stock option trades, following the previous steps for short-term option trades. If necessary, use Schedule D-1 (continuation sheet for Schedule D) to report all the transactions.

How to Calculate Stock Prices From a Balance Sheet

Identify the firm's total stockholder's equity holdings from the balance sheet. This includes the firm's preferred stock, common stock, additional paid-in-capital, and any retained earnings. For example if the firm's balance sheet showed $1 million of preferred stock, $5 million of common stock, $800,000 of additional paid-in-capital, and $500,000 in retained earnings, the firm's total equity holdings value would be 7.3 million. The equation would be 1,000,000 + 5,000,000 + 800,000 + 500,000 = 7,300,000. If the firms total assets are $10 million, this would leave $2.7 million in liabilities. The equation would be 10,000,000 - 7,300,000 = 2,700,000.
Determine the firm's total common stockholder's equity from the balance sheet. Calculate the firm's total common stockholder's equity by subtracting the total preferred stock value from the firm's total stockholder's equity holdings. For example, if the firm's total stock holder's equity is $7.3 million and its preferred stock holdings are $1 million, then the firm's total common stock holder's equity would be $6.3 million. The equation would be 7,300,000 - 1,000,000 = 6,300,000. The $6.3 million represents the total value of the common equity shareholders portion of the firm's total equity capital structure.
Calculate the firm's stock price book value from the balance sheet. Divide the firm's total common stockholder's equity by the average number of common shares outstanding. For example, if the firm's total common stockholder's equity is $6.3 million and the average number of common shares outstanding is $100,000, then the stock price's book value for the firm would be $63. The equation would be 6,300,000 / 100,000 = 63. This would be based on the information obtained from the firm's balance sheet.