Create stock certificates for your company

When you set up a firm or company, it's required by law that you create stock certificates and give them to share holders. The following easy steps show you how to create stock certificates by yourself.

1. First of all you will need "OpenOffice.org", an open-source office software available for free at http://www.openoffice.org. Download and install OpenOffice.org on your PC.

2. Download and save the file (right click on the link and choose save link as) "en-stock-certificate-template.odt" on your PC.

3. Open "Writer", a word-processing module in OpenOffice.org (go to Start menu > OpenOffice.org > OpenOffice.org Writer).

4. In OpenOffice.org Writer, open the downloaded file "en-stock-certificate-template.odt" (go to File menu> Open > en-stock-certificate-template.odt). This file is a template in which you can just change appropriate information with that of your company and share holders. The template consists of a frame image as a background of the page overlaid by a watermark image and text information.

In order to change text information, you cannot just click on the text because the watermark image will be selected instead of the text. A workaround is to use Find & Replace function (go to Edit menu > Find & Replace) to search for a word that exists in the text. For example, input the word "share" and press Find > Close, that word will be highlighted. Now you can use arrow keys to move the cursor up, down, left or right to the location that you want to change text information. After editing the text information, save the file in a new name related to the share holder or certificate number. You can also export the stock certificate to PDF format to freeze everything in place (go to File menu > Export as PDF > Export).

5. Now you have a certificate in a PDF file. Repeat steps 1- 4 until you have all certificates in PDF files. Print PDF files onto good quality papers with color inks. Let them dry completely. Ask director(s) of your company to put on signature(s), stamp them with the company's seal, and you are ready to hand them out to share holders. A completed stock certificate (with signature and seal stamp) may look like the one below (click on the image to enlarge it).