Nathaniel Thiele

Directly holding stock means that a company directly reaches out to you for information and update requests. Directly holding stocks allows you to be an active shareholder and make you a valuable part of the company team. Directly holding a stock you must use a transfer agent such as Computershare to get hold of ownership. This may cause extra fees and causes the stock to be extremely illiquid.

If you hold in the street name, then the broker registers the stock however, you own the stock. Street names protect you from losses with the SPIC and help to ensure you have minimal losses. This means you can loan the stocks to other investors and it is very liquid. Examples would be fidelity, Charles Schwab, or other brokers.

I have been debating on getting some of my stocks to be registered direct name as I want to hold the company long-term and purposely want the stock to be illiquid. Your situation may be different so you may want to keep your stocks in street name. This is not financial advice.