How to Make a Stock Certificate (4 Steps)

Draft the wording for the front and back of the certificate. On the front side, include your company’s full legal name, the name of the person to whom you’re issuing the stock, the number of shares the certificate represents and the issue date; leave a space for the business owner or corporate officers to sign. On the back side, summarize 'fine print' legal rights and limitations. For example, explain that there is a waiting period between when an employee receives stock as part of a private company's stock option and can sell it.
Set the page orientation of an 8.5-inch by 11-inch sheet of 32-pound paper to landscape, as most stock certificates run horizontally across the page. Then set page margins as wide as possible, about 0.5 inches on all four sides. Choose the center alignment option so the certificate has an equal amount of white space on both sides. Turn on paragraph marks using the show-hide option if you need help with spacing or placement. Once you finish the first certificate, save it as a template.
Find a border using the Borders and Shading or the Clip Art feature in your word processing program, or visit websites such as PDClipart.org or FreePrintableBorders4U.com that offer free downloadable borders. Follow the Walt Disney Company’s lead and include a unique background that allows you to use a stock certificate as a branding tool. Although you most likely don’t have the option to include drawings of famous characters like the Walt Disney Company does, you can include your company logo, a picture of your facility or pictures of your products or services. Insert background images as watermarks to make sure the background doesn’t interfere with foreground text.
Select an appropriate font and font size. Stock certificates commonly use a cursive or script-style font such as Old English, Script or Calligraphy for the business name and title, and a standard font such as Times New Roman or Arial for the remaining information on the front and the back. Choose no more than one or two fonts to avoid a cluttered appearance. Set the font size to about 48 points for the title and 11 points to 14 points for the body to make sure all the information is clear and readable

How to Follow the Stock Market (3 Steps)

Visit a major financial charting portal such as Google Finance or Yahoo! Finance for real-time updates to the major stock market indexes, such as the S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average. You can also get current minute-by-minute updates on individual stocks. The Google Finance system provides other tools for following the stock market as well. It streams news events for any company you chart on the website. News items are attached to the chart so you can see how prices reacted historically. If desired, you can use Google Finance to compare an individual stock's returns to that of a major market index to see if it is outperforming the overall market over a set period of time.
Monitor the pre-market data before the stock market opens each day. This information is available from financial services outlets such as CNN Money and CNBC. The data consists of futures contract pricing. Futures are special market derivatives that are traded 24 hours. If major market-moving events occur overnight due to international stock markets, the futures will reflect this in the morning. The stock market usually opens around the same levels of the futures. Thus it is possible to see how stocks might trade even before the session begins. This is a great way to follow stock market behavior in real-time.
Study the 'Bullish Percent Index' of individual stock market sectors if you wish to follow the professional sentiment among major money managers at mutual funds and hedge funds. This index is available for many sectors as well as the overall stock market index. Traders who incorporate sentiment readings into their strategies often follow the stock market in this way. It is an innovate approach to reading the minds of the biggest movers in the stock market. When sentiment is very high, the bullish percent may read 90 percent or above. This means that most of the major players in the stock market feel optimistic about market activity. 'Contrarian' traders treat such extremes in sentiment as a warning. If nearly everyone is optimistic, then is no one left to convince. This means that new buying energy may not enter the market and, contrary to the sentiment, prices might start to fall.

How to Issue New Shares of Common Stock

Decide on the funds that are needed. This will help you decide on how many shares of stock to issue. The price of the stock will be based on the price of your company's stock that is already on the market or on an investment banker's view of how much the stock is worth after doing a thorough check of the finances and operations. The investment bankers are referred to as underwriters. If you have not issued any stock yet, the price is based on the amount set when your corporate application was filed with the Secretary of State's office.
Obtain approval from the board of directors to issue new stock to the public if you are already in operation. If just starting out a business, approval is not needed, and in most cases a board of directors will not be set up yet.
File a registration statement. This is obtained from the SEC. On the statement, besides the basic company information, you will need to state how many shares of common stock you want to issue. You must file at least 20 days before you are going to release the stock.
Notify investors if you are searching for a quick sale to one entity or want an investment bank to buy the stock and reissue to the public for you.
Offer shares to shareholders. This is another option with the issuing of the new stock. You may offer shares based on the percentage of shares that each person or entity already owns.
Allow the issue of stock to go public once the application is processed. If you prefer to have a public sale instead of allowing the stock to go to shareholders, investors, or banks, then allow the stock to be sold on the open market after the SEC approves the application.