bonds and debenture debts of many industrial companies are fortified by mortgage rights giving power of foreclosure to the holders in case of default. How much these rights are worth will be discussed when we come to consider in detail the various kinds of securities.
Proprietorship is acquired by the buyer of ordinary or common shares or stocks, which represent the capital of the concern, the bonds or debentures being its debt, or part of it. Holders of the ordinary rank last for a slice of the profits, but they are entitled to all that is left after the expenses of the business, including wages, salaries, directors' fees, taxation, interest on debt, sinking fund for its redemption, depreciation, provision for bad debts and all other outgoings and charges have been met. The "functionless" shareholder puts down the money that starts the business and waits until all other claimants have been satisfied in full before he sees any return on it; and whatever is over, if anything, is his. His position is thus necessarily speculative, so much so that some people say that he is not an investor at all but a speculator pure and simple. But the degree of uncertainty involved concerning the income that he is likely to receive varies so greatly with the record and standing of the company in which he is interested that he may be either
