Smith v. Universal Service Motors Co.

The Chancellor.

The status of stockholder in a corporation is not dependent on the issuance to him of a certificate of stock. The certificate is only an evidence of ownership — a muniment of title. Though not an essential prerequisite to the fact of ownership, a certificate of stock, like all muniments of title, is a valuable paper, the possession of which evidences in permanent form the stockholder’s ownership with its incidents of rights and facilitates its sale and transfer. So important is the right to a certificate of stock that the statute under which the defendant was incorporated…