When it comes to investing in stocks, most people today trust the professional financial managers that are working their investments, but even the most trustworthy investor should educate themselves on the actual explanation of the trade itself.

Investing in individual stocks is not right for everyone, but you won’t really know if it is right for you until you understand how the stock market works.

Stocks are a small portion of ownership in a company by people playing the stock market. Each portion is referred to as a share, a small percentage of the total ownership for the corporation. Shares are trafficked electronically in today’s world whereas they were previously trafficked with actual paper certificates.

(People often wonder why owning a stock share is so intriguing to others.)

First, a share means you have a share of the company’s profits, meaning your share will increase as the company increases profits. The distribution of these profits are called dividends and you have the option of reinvesting your cut or cashing it out. Every time the stock rises you gain money based on your shares.

If the stock goes up $1 per share and you have 100 shares, you just made $100.

The stock table is where most shareholders track their stocks and these appear confusing and difficult to read to beginners, but spend a little time and you’ll figure it out. Let’s run through what you need to know in order to read the details an understand them easily.

The ticker symbol is listed first as it is the abbreviated symbol that the stock market uses to identify your company. For example, GE is General Electric, WMT is Walmart. Once you select a company, you’ll need to know its shorthand name to track its progress.

Another confusing idea is that the company’s name may be listed, but most omit the name to save space. After that the number of sales in the last trading day appears, usually listed in the 100,000’s, so 267 means 267,000 shares were bought and sold on the last day the market was open.

Following that is the high and low price for the previous trading day that the stock was bought or sold. This is a great reference to see how much the stock is changing in a day because the price of shares moves all day long.

Closing price is listed next, the last price that the stock traded for as the market closed, this will also be the beginning price for the next trading day.

Following the closing price is the table that will list the change, or the amount the stock changed when you compare yesterday’s closing price with the closing price for the next trading day.

Finally, the table list will change after the closing price, listed as a positive number or a negative number. Stock tables are usually found in the Wall Street Journal, but can be found many other places as well.

Duncan Roberts has been learning, investing and writing about making money in the stock market for a number of years. You can read more of his ramblings and tips for investing in stocks at his investment site, http://www.theadvicecentre.info/investing/index.htm