Stock prices from the previous day’s trading are printed in tables in most newspapers Tuesday through Saturday, and the week’s activity is commonly summarized on Sunday. These tables use an extremely abbreviated format, including footnotes to indicate various situations. The tables are distributed by the Associated Press.
This article lists the most commonly used footnotes about stock prices, the stock itself, and dividends (three parts in the following table), so if your newspaper doesn’t explain its tables, this might help. Sources consulted for this information include the Baltimore Sun, the New Jersey Star-Ledger, and others; your local paper will probably be similar, although typesetting tricks like boldface etc. may vary across different papers. The long and the short of it is you want your companies to have lots of u’s and never anything that starts with v (you have to wonder about the use of adjacent letters).
| Footnote | Explanation |
|---|---|
| Price | |
| d | Price is a new 52-week low |
| u | Price is a new 52-week high |
| x | Ex-dividend (ex-rights) price |
| y | Ex-dividend and sales in full |
| z | Sales in full |
| Stock | |
| g | Dividend or earnings in Canadian currency |
| n | New issue in the past 52 weeks (i.e., the high/low aren’t true 52-week figures) |
| pf | Preferred shares |
| pp | Holder owes installments of purchase price |
| rt | Rights |
| s | Split or stock dividend of more than 25% in the past 52 weeks |
| un | Units |
| v | Trading was halted on the primary market |
| vj | Bankrupt, reorganizing, etc. |
| wd | When distributed |
| wi | When issued |
| wt | Warrants |
| ww | With warrants |
| xw | Without warrants |
| Dividend | |
| a | Also extra(s) |
| b | Annual rate plus stock div. |
| c | Liquidating div. |
| e | Declared or paid in preceding 12 months. |
| f | Annual dividend rate increased. |
| i | Declared or paid after stock dividend or split up |
| j | Paid this year, div. omitted, deferred or no action taken at last div. meeting. |
| k | Declared or paid this year, an accumulative issue with div. in arrears |
| r | Declared or paid in preceding 12 months plus stock div. |
| t | Paid in stock in preceding 12 months, est. cash value on ex-div. or ex-dist. date |
| Other | |
| boldface | Stock’s price changed 5% or more from previous day |
| underline | Stock’s trading volume equalled or exceeded 2 percent of the total number of shares outstanding. |
| triangle | Stock reached a 52-week high (pointing up) or low (pointing down) |
Article Credits:
Contributed-By: Bruce A. Werner, Chris Lott