What action by president lincoln most angered the radical reoublicans in congress.
Shares also trade in a secondary market on stock exchanges. A company can increase or decrease the number of shares outstanding without an IPO through stock splits and reverse splits. In all cases, the beneficiary of reverse split activity is the management of the company performing the reverse split. Shareholders may or may not benefit depending on the specifics of the reverse split.
A lot of things can happen to a company and its stock. Stocks can split or reverse split, companies acquire other companies or merge, change their name, the firm can be taken private or declare bankruptcy and vanish from the stock market. Some events are positive events for investors; others are not. Reverse splits are typically the result of negative forces.