Anticipating being offered stock options in a privately held company upon employment. What questions should I ask?
The company doesn't necessarily have to go public. They can also be worth money if the company is acquired. Also keep in mind that even if the company does eventually go public, your shares can essentially be wiped out by a round of pre-IPO funding that gives the company a low valuation. You could ask: I've had stock options at two different jobs.   If you are not getting a significant ownership stake, but rather just a portion of options as incentive to come work there, I would value them at $0.    If you get the same salary and benefits, but no stock options at another company and you like the other company better, I'd go to the other company. I say this because there are so many legal changes that seem to take value from you that you might as well not consider the options in your debate. That being said, the most important question I'd want to know is what incentive does the company have to going public or getting bought?    If the company is majority owned by investors, the stock options are likely to be worth something if you wait long enough.   You are essentially following someone else's bet.    If the company is owned by 2 or 3 individuals who want to make lots of money, they may or may not decide to sell or go public. Good questions. I can only add that it may be valuable if the company is bought, they may buy the options. Happened to me in previous company.
The problem with predicting with accuracy what a stock price will do in any given situation is that there are two main factors that affect a stocks price. The first factor is based somewhat in math as it takes into account numbers such as supply and demand, earnings per share, expected earnings, book value, debt ratio and a wide variety of other numbers. You can compile all those numbers into a variety of formulas and come up with a rational estimate of what the stock should sell for. This is all well and good and if the market were entirely rational it would rarely make news because it would be predictable and boring. This is where our second factor throws a wrench in the works.  The second factor affecting stock price is emotional. There are many examples of people's emotions affecting stock price but if you would like a good example look up the price fluctuations of Apple  (AAPL) after their last couple earnings reports. Numerically their company looks good, their earnings were healthy, their EPS is below average yet their price fell following the report. Why is that?  There really isn't a rational reason for it, it is driven by the emotions behind unmet expectations. In a more general sense sometimes price goes down and people get scared and sell causing further decline, sometimes people get excited and see it as opportunity to buy in and the price stabilizes. It is much more difficult to anticipate the reaction the market will have to people's emotional whims which is why predicting stock price with accuracy is near impossible.  As a thought along the same line ask yourself this question; if the stock market were entirely rational and price could be predicted with accuracy why is there such a wide range of available strike prices available in the options market?  It seems that if stock price could be predicted with anything remotely reassembling accuracy the options market need a much smaller selection of available strike prices. /u/NotMyRealFaceBook  As a sniff test, I threw the following assumptions into a Black-Scholes options pricing calculator:  * Stock Price and Strike Price = $200  * Valuation date = 10/31/2017  * Expiration date = 10/29/2027 (European style - no early exercise)  * Volatility = 20% (on the low end for a tech. company - but again see the non-log-normal assumption point above)  * Interest rate = 4% (on the high end - which means the option seller is over-charging you)  * Dividend yield = 0%  The calculator's theoretical call option price results in $82.  Unless the company in question has a materially skewed upside given today's starting valuation, my opinion is the options you are offered are being priced via a Black-Scholes model and are over-priced. Vesting As you may know a stock option is the right to acquire a given amount of stock at a given price.  Actually acquiring the stock is referred to as exercising the option.  Your company is offering you options over 200,000 shares but not all of those options can be exercised immediately. Initially you will only be able to acquire 25,000 shares; the other 175,000 have conditions attached, the condition in this case presumably being that you are still employed by the company at the specified time in the future.  When the conditions attached to a stock option are satisfied that option is said to have vested - this simply means that the holder of the option can now exercise that option at any time they choose and thereby acquire the relevant shares. Dividends Arguably the primary purpose of most private companies is to make money for their owners (i.e. the shareholders) by selling goods and/or services at a profit.  How does that money actually get to the shareholders?  There are a few possible ways of which paying a dividend is one.  Periodically (potentially annually but possibly more or less frequently or irregularly) the management of a company may look at how it is doing and decide that it can afford to pay so many cents per share as a dividend.  Every shareholder would then receive that number of cents multiplied by the number of shares held. So for example in 4 years or so, after all your stock options have vested and assuming you have exercised them you will own 200,000 shares in your company.  If the board declares a dividend of 10 cents per share you would receive $20,000.  Depending on where you are and your exact circumstances you may or may not have to pay tax on this. Those are the basic concepts - as you might expect there are all kinds of variations and complications that can occur, but that's hopefully enough to get you started. "If human beings were Homo Economicus, i.e. textbook rational and self-interested economic-minded beings, as opposed to simply human, then yes, simple advice like ""just stay out of debt and your credit score will take care of itself"" could work.  Your simplification would be very persuasive to such a being. However, people are not perfectly rational.  We buy something we shouldn't have, we charge it on a credit card, we can't afford to pay it off at the end of the month.  We lose our job.  Our furnace breaks down, or our roof leaks, and we didn't anticipate the replacement cost.  Some of this is our fault, some of it isn't – basically, shit happens .. and we get into debt...  maybe even knowing all the while we shouldn't have. Our credit history and score takes a hit.  Only then do we find out there are consequences! Our interest rates go up, our insurance companies raise premiums, our prospective new employers or landlords run credit checks and either deny us the job or the apartment. Telling a person who asks for help about their credit history/score that they shouldn't have taken on debt in the first place is like telling the farmer he should have kept the barn door shut so the horse wouldn't run out.  While it is not ""bad"" advice, it's not the only kind of advice to offer when somebody finds themselves in such a situation. Adding advice about corrective actions is more helpful.  The person probably already know that they shouldn't have overspent in the first place and got into debt.  Yes, remind them of the value of being sensible about debt in the first place – it's good reinforcement – but add some helpful advice to the mix.  e.g. ""So you're in debt.  You shouldn't have lived beyond your means.  But now that you are in this mess, here's what you can do to improve the situation.""" 1st question: If I bought 1 percent share of company X, but   unfortunately it closed down because of some reason as it was 1   million in debt. Since I had 1 percent of it shares, does it mean I   also have to pay the 1 percent of it's debt? Stock holders are not liable for anything more than their current holdings.  In cases of Ch11 bankruptcy stock holders usually get nothing.  In Ch7 the holdings will be severely hit but one may get 10% of pre-bk prices.  I would strongly recommend against investing in bankrupt companies.  A seasoned trader can make plenty off short term trades. The payoff structure is usually: 2nd question: Is there an age requirements to enter the stock market?   I am 15 years old this year. Yes it is generally 18, but some firms offer a joint option that your parents can open. I looked them up after class and it's a company with many different branches and it doesn't really specify what his title is (besides VP) or what kind of work he does. I'm thinking I'll just have to wait till the interview to know exactly what his job entails. But thank you! The general rule with stock options is that it's best to wait until expiration to exercise them.  The rationale depends on a few factors and there are exceptions. Reasons to wait: There would be cases to exercise early: Tax implications should be checked with a professional advisor specific to your situation. In the employee stock option plans that I have personally seen, you get regular income tax assessed between exercise price and current price at the time you exercise.  Your tax basis is then set to the current price.  You also pay capital gains tax when you eventually sell, which will be long or short term based on the time that you held the stock. (The time that you held the options does not count.)  I believe that other plans may be set up differently. I’m preparing for an interview with Vanguard &amp; What I was told to do was to practice answering behavioral questions in the STAR format. Made a word doc answering popular questions in that format. Also just know as much as possible about the company. Reading their market and economic outlook and asking a question based on that could be good too.