One billion shares
the company is privately held... How many shares are issued?
Microsoft does not own any shares in Apple. As part of the settlement to a long running legal dispute between the two companies Microsoft invested $150 million in non-voting Apple stock in 1997. The stock was not held for very long and was sold for a profit.
The piece of paper that indicates how many shares you own is called a stock certificate. It serves as proof of ownership of a specific number of shares in a company. In many cases today, ownership is recorded electronically, and physical stock certificates are less common. However, they can still be issued by some companies upon request.
2.5 billion
To obtain a Berkshire Hathaway stock certificate, you need to purchase shares through a brokerage firm. Once you own the shares, you can request a physical stock certificate by contacting your broker or the company's transfer agent, which is currently Computershare. Keep in mind that many investors prefer electronic shares for convenience and security, but physical certificates can still be issued upon request.
A company does not have a definite number of shares of stock. The company can choose to split the number of shares into any ratio with prior announcement.
100
There are 917 million Apple shares available for trading. Individuals and institutions can hold blocks of these shares so it is not known how many shareholders there are.
6
it depends on the company
1000
Shares of stock that are issued at a value in excess of a company's actual assets are known as watered stock. The term arose many decades ago when a par value was assigned to shares of stock by the board of directors. The par value was correlated by many investors to the actual asset value per share of a company since companies could not sell additional stock below the stated or par value. Dishonest stock promoters would deceptively assign a high par value in order to sell overvalued or watered shares to investors. Due to investor confusion and misuse by shady stock issuers legislation was passed to allow stock to be issued at no par value. Once used as a metric of stock valuation, the term par value has little meaning for present day investors.