The Place of Bonds in Financing Business Activity

The article describes how the Polish enterprises include shares in financing their activity. After presenting the history of shares and the most important legal acts regulating their use on the Polish territories the author describes various kinds of shares according to various criteria: the share holder, the buy out and privileges. He also discusses main functions of shares like enabling even small capital owners to finance their economic activity as well as governing the enterprise by the fraction of share holders which is not in the interest of the rest. The author stresses the share's price parameter: the nominal price, the emission price and current, market price, and discusses the opportunities offered by shares to the enterprise. The shares can contribute to the enterprise's capital as well as the venture capital at the Stock Exchange. The privileges to the share's owner are also considered. The results of two surveys are presented.The first survey involved enterprises located in Gdansk, Gdynia, Sopot and neighbourhood, the kind of shares they emitted and the frequency of share emission. The other survey involved data based on the share emission prospects of various enterprises present at the Warsaw Stock Exchange. Other ways of exploiting shares for instance to gain a strategic investor, to save joint venture from bankruptcy or in the case of merger are mentioned as well.