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Friday 26 July 2019

Difference between Stakeholders and Shareholders/Stockholders

What is the difference between Stakeholders and Shareholders?

The term 'Stakeholders' is wider in meaning. The term 'Stakeholders' is much wider than the term 'Shareholders'.

Shareholders are the owners of the joint-stock company.

In a joint-stock company, people who own the shares of the company are known as shareholders. Shareholders contribute to the capital of the company and assume the risk of loss.

Shareholders are always at the risk of losing their capital, i.e. the money that they have invested in the joint-stock company.

The term 'Stakeholders' includes customers, creditors, employees, the government and others who have a stake in the company apart from the shareholders. Shareholders are also part of the stakeholders.

So every shareholder is a stakeholder but not every stakeholder is a shareholder.




The term 'Stakeholders' includes all those people who have an interest in the success or failure of the business.

These are the people who are going to be impacted directly or indirectly by the success or failure of the business.

For example, if a business fails, then the employees may not get a part of their salary, the government may also lose some tax revenue, creditors may lose the money they have lent to the business, shareholders may lose their capital. Hence all these are considered as stakeholders of the business.

The term 'Shareholders' is strictly used in connection with the joint-stock company as only a joint-stock company can have shareholders.

But the term 'Stakeholders' can be used in connection with any business enterprise like a sole proprietorship, partnership, joint-stock company, etc. For sole proprietorship also there will be stakeholders. These will be the people who would be interested in the success or failure of the business of the sole proprietorship.

However sole proprietorship will not have any shareholders as a sole proprietorship cannot raise money or capital by issuing shares to the public

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