Share class (original) (raw)

In finance, a share class or share classification are different types of shares in company share capital that have different levels of voting rights. For example, a company might create two classes of shares class A share and a class B share where the class A shares have fewer rights than class B shareholders. This may be done to maintain control of a company by a group of shareholders or to make a company more difficult to take over. For example, a company may create preferred stock as a poison pill that so that all Shareholder of common stock cannot agree to a merger or takeover plan.