Stock Price Charts

Why do stock share values fluctuate after companies go out of business?

If you look at marketwatch and look at the charts for Lehman Brothers and even Enron, they fluctuate some. Lehman Brothers is currently at 8 cents a share and about a month ago, it briefly jumped to 73 cents a share. Enron has been to 2 cents a share this year. If they go out of business, than why do they even have a ticker, and what makes them fluctuate? Sure its pretty much a negligible amount but it really doesnt make sense.

Public Comments

1. It Just like on last gasp of air for the dieing. Just like when a dead person twitches or defecates in their pants.
2. There is no law that prohibits "stupid people" from participating in the stock market, and the shares in any company still exist even after they go out of business. Who are we to stop one idiot from selling worthless pieces of paper to another idiot? The "penny stock" market is populated entirely by people that engage in this sort of behavior!
3. "Go out of Business" is not the right description here. In general when stocks go Bankrupt they move that stock to the pinksheets and place a Q behind the symbol. Not all companies that declare bankruptcies then go out of business, some can restructure and and emerge a much better company with a more manageable debt load. A great majority of these companies often chose to wipe out the common shareholders by issuing new shares and declaring the old company equity worthless, such as what happend in General Motors this year. 99% of the time the old shares do become worthless but in some cases when the company itself is worth far more than the debts that are owed then that is when things can get interesting. Two recent bankrupt super stories just this year alone are General Growth Properties(GGPWQ) and Vermillion Inc(VRMLQ). Long story short GGP is a mall REIT with a ton of debt but hold some of the best commercial real estate around, the stock dropped down to .25 on the news of a bankruptcy, it now trades at over $10 on what appears to be an emergence from BK with the common stock not being declared worthless. VRMLQ was in bankruptcy protection when they received news of an FDA approval on their Ovarian Cancer Detection tests, the stock which was sitting at .01 is now trading at over $20. I trade over on Investorshub.com, we have a Bankruptcy board set up there for discussion on BK companies, my username is MWM, I welcome anyone to come and participate in the discussion... All it takes is just one of these stocks to make an unbelievable profit and that my friend is why you see these Q stocks still trade after declaring bankruptcy...
4. You can find a lot of answers to your qustions at http://stockbuying.org