Stock Registration for dummies

Hello retards,

I had a question nagging at me ever since Vlad the impaler and old Thomas Petterfy stopped my flawless dip buy of my favorite stock @ 100 a share on Jan 28th. As I sat there enraged on the toilet slamming my phone screen with my thumbs I was struck with a thought....how do I know that my shares are mine? These shares are actually owned by my broker, and only in my shady ass broker's books does it say I am the owner. is there a way for me to own my shares without having to worry about a broker as a middleman? who does that? why do they do that? what are the pros and cons?

And so today, rather than do my work I finally decided to find out. So I called fidelity and the customer service rep trotted to the back office to ask his smart accounting nerds because he didn't have a fucking clue either. Turns out becoming a registered share holder is done through what's called a transfer agent, and these agents are selected by the issuing company. The transfer agent and the registrar (the DTC) handle the registration of shares in the direct registration system (DRS) which is some sort of electronic book keeping system meant to keep track of who owns what shares. He was kind enough to give me the name and phone number of GME's transfer agent:

computershare 800-522-6645

I then had a web chat with a saucy looking customer rep named Donna A. who told me exactly how I can transfer my shares from my brokerage account to establish an account with computershare:

The broker will need to submit a request for a DTC W/T Transmission. Computershare cannot initiate this transfer. If the broker is unfamiliar with the DTC Transmission process, they should contact their back office for assistance or contact their representative at DTC.

The broker will initiate the request through their back office using the following shareholder information:

1 The complete name of the Transfer Agent: Computershare Investor Services.
2 Tax ID Number (TIN).
3 The exact registration (complete name and address) on the Computershare account. (If the shareholder does not have an existing Computershare account, provide the exact registration as it appears on the brokerage account.)
4 Exact number of shares to be transferred (whole shares only).
5 The full CUSIP number of the stock holding company.
Note: If the registration, address, and SSN match the shares will go into the existing account, if anything is off it will open a new account.

by "existing account" she's referring to an existing account with computershare, which I opened this morning by buying a single share through the directstock purchase program. this is the second way in which you can acquire shares in your name, buy them through your account with computershare. now this process seems less desirable to me. Since buying a share was the only way I could figure out how to open an account through their website (which their phone system directed me to do), I entered my personal info, tax information and a checking account and routing number and then selected how much money I wanted to invest. I picked $150 for about one share. I was notified that my purchase will be bought on the market 5 days from now (at whatever price it is), and settled in my account 2 days after (well jesus that's slow). Donna says they will buy whatever amount of shares they can get for the dollar amount I selected (including partial shares).

It should be noted here, that to sell the shares through the transfer agent computershare is also an arduously slow process. you can submit a sell order that gets issued to the market on a predetermined schedule (say 5 days from the day you initiate it). I can also transfer them out to one of my brokerage accounts to sell them. Fidelity warned me that this could take days to transfer, because it requires the request and coordination of individuals in the two back offices to effectuate (similar to when I transferred my shares from one brokerage to another it took 48 hours or so). I warned them that I might be retarded enough to casually ignore such a warning and if I ever needed to sell which was highly unlikely, well then those buyers won't mind waiting a couple of days for my shares to clear.

so you may be asking why would someone do this, why would they abandon their broker and restrict their ability to quickly buy and sell their shares. There's a few decent articles if you search Direct registration system (thebalance dot com) in google but essentially it was created for:

• investors who want counter party risk against your stockbroker going bankrupt, your claim is with the issuing company, not the brokerage so you don't have to deal with SIPC or the hassle of getting your account back afterwards
• removing the middleman from delivering annual reports, 10k filings, proxy statements, voting info etc. since your name and address are recorded directly these materials are mailed or emailed to you promptly as the shareholder of records
• inability for brokers to lend your shares. for dividend stocks if your shares are lent for shorting the dividend can become an unqualified "payment in lieu of dividends" increasing your tax burden. The brokers don't have your shares, can't use them for collateral can't do shit with them because they are yours
• I have not investigated yet, but computershare has countries outside the US (Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, Ireland, New Zealand, South Africa, United Kingdom) listed, implying that if I ever move to one of those countries I could buy shares in my name and get access to direct voting and dividends and all the other joys of being a real shareholder.

TLDR: I was curious how to own my shares directly, not through some shell corporation owned by a bulgarian vampire, so I found out and decided to share with the few of you retards who can actually read.