Wallpaper

What Is Wallpaper?

Wallpaper is the name given to stocks, bonds, and different securities that have become worthless. This colloquialism saw its starting points when stocks and bonds existed as printed, physical certificates instead of digital recognizing data stored on a brokerage server.

The name stuck, in any case, and means when a stock or bond certificate (or one more exercisable right to securities, for example, stock options) no longer has value due to different reasons, most commonly, bankruptcy.

Figuring out Wallpaper

The term "wallpaper" suggests that on the grounds that the certificates are worthless, they should wallpaper your home with them. This was a genuine practice during the Great Depression that followed the Stock Market Crash of 1929. In that period, physical paper certificates addressed real ownership of shares of a company.

At the point when the stock market crashed on Black Thursday (Oct. 25, 1929), $30 billion was immediately lost. That amount was two times the U.S. national debt at that point. Exactly 20,000 companies failed, which left numerous investors with a great deal of worthless paper.

Those fortunate enough to stay away from vagrancy utilized the now-worthless stock certificates to paper their walls, an old technique used to plug drafts before protection was widely accessible or utilized. Others might have cynically stuck the worthless certificates to their walls as decoration.

Presently, wallpaper is utilized to portray any security that has lost all value, even assuming that there could be as of now not a functional use for it.

Try not to toss out your old stock certificates since they might turn out to be important.

Advanced Examples of Wallpaper

A few cutting edge instances of wallpaper incorporate various companies that went belly up during the dotcom bubble burst of March 2000 to October 2002, and the Great Recession of the late 2000s and mid 2010s.

A few models incorporate online retailers Pets.com and Webvan when the dotcom bubble burst and Lehman Brothers during the Great Recession.

Collectible Wallpaper

Old securities certificates have found another life: as a collectible. Collectors have been known to pay large number of dollars for certificates that are considered quality craftsmanship, famous pictures, have the marks or pictures of renowned people, or were issued by famous or prominent corporations or state run administrations.

A few famous models are really rare, for example, a Confederate States of America $1,000 bond and a 1887 stock certificate from Chadborn and Coldwell Manufacturing Co. (later Toro Co.) highlighting a vignette of a kid cutting a grass. Each is valued at about $2,500.

The practice of collecting obsolete or worthless "wallpaper" stock and bond certificates is called scripophily.

Special Considerations

People who hold old stock certificates bearing the names of a distant memory companies shouldn't expect they are worthless, in any case.

Many years of mergers, acquisitions, name changes, and stock splits don't mean a stock is worthless. It could mean that a stock is worth definitely more than one expects relying upon the situation. In the event that it isn't worth cash as a genuine stock, you might find a collector who will pay great money for it. As the familiar proverb goes: "One individual's junk might be someone else's fortune."

Features

• During times of economic downturn, similar to the Great Depression, pointless stock certificates were utilized as protection or as genuine wallpaper.
• The term wallpaper was stylish when stocks and bonds existed as printed, physical certificates.
• The colloquialism, wallpaper, alludes to stocks, bonds, and different securities that have lost all market value.