1870: The Trans-Mississippi

5 Stock Round

A stock round consists of consecutive player turns in clockwise order. The stock round continues until all players have passed in order. During the stock round, players buy private companies or buy and sell shares in operating or new companies. Players may also perform actions for companies that they are the president of. The initial stock round has special rules. See section 5.7

5.1 The Stock Market

5.1.1 Sections

There are seven sections to the stock market grid.
  1. UPPER AREA: All white spaces (including those in the Red Outlined area) above the upper ledge, are known as the Upper Area.
  2. LOWER AREA: All white spaces between the upper ledge and the lower ledge are known as the Lower Area. There are special rules for moving Stock Market tokens from the upper area to the lower area. See rules section 5.8.1.
  3. RED OUTLINED AREA: These are the places where newly formed companies place their share value token. The Red Outlined area has no other effect on play. (See Starting a Company, section 5.5)
  4. YELLOW SECTION: Shares of companies whose share value tokens are in this area do not count towards your certificate limit.
  5. GREEN: Shares of companies whose share value tokens are in this area do not count towards your stock limit. Companies whose share value tokens are in this area may be held in excess of the normal 60% share limits.
  6. BROWN SECTION: Shares of companies whose share value tokens are in this area do not count towards your stock limit. Companies whose share value tokens are in this area may be held in excess of the normal 60% share limits. Also, during the stock round, a player may purchase all available company shares, from the Open Market. Shares in the initial offering must still be purchased one at a time.

  7. CLOSING SECTION: (Grey area) A company whose share value token enters the Grey 'Closing' section of the stock market at any time is immediately removed from play. All tokens of that company are removed from the map and stock market, and all share certificates of that company are collected without compensation to the owners. Any trains owned by that company are placed on the open market.

    Any money in that company is returned to the bank.

    Any Private Companies in that company are placed in the Open Market and are available for purchase at their listed price.

    Companies closed in this fashion may not be restarted. The share limits are reduced for each company closed. If this happens during a stock round, the new share limit takes effect immediately. If the change occurs during an operating round, the share limit drops immediately, but you are not required to sell down to the new limit until your next stock action. This will be either your first action in the next stock round or a Forced Sale to raise money for a train purchase.

5.1.2 Par Value Display

The par value display has two sections.
The six white boxes with values of $ 68, $ 72, $ 76, $ 82, $ 90 and $ 100 are used when starting a new company. These six boxes and the six light grey boxes with values of $ 110, $ 120, $ 140, $ 160, $ 180 and $ 200 are used when a company reissues shares. The par value boxes from $ 76 to $ 200 each have a small number in brackets in them. This number is used when you reissue shares. This number is the minimum open market share value needed to be able to reissue at that price.

5.1.3 Open Market

The open market holds shares that players sell. This box is sometimes too small to hold all of the shares, so if necessary, use the table space beside this box to hold the excess shares.

5.1.4 Share Price Chart

In the open market box is a share price display. This shows the cost of from one to six shares of a company at each of the six possible starting values.

5.1.5 Round Marker Display

This display holds the operating round marker. This marker is adjusted at the end of each round to indicate what the next round is. It has four boxes; Stock Round, Operating Round 1, Operating Round 2, and Operating Round 3.

5.2 Starting and Ending a Stock Round

5.2.1 Starting a Stock Round

The stock round starts with the player with the priority card. Play in the stock round normally proceeds from player to player in clockwise direction. If a president uses the share protection rules, the order may change, skipping players.

5.2.2 Ending a Stock Round

The stock round ends when everybody has passed in order. The priority card is given to the person to the left of the last person to do a stock action affecting the priority order. These actions include, buying a share(s), selling a share(s), issuing a share(s), redeeming a share or buying a private company.

5.2.3 Adjust For All Sold

Share value tokens of companies that have all 10 shares in the hands of players or the company (redeemed) at the end of the stock round are adjusted up one row for being all sold. Companies are checked in share price order.

5.3 Player Actions During A Stock Round

During a player's stock round turn, a player may do an action for himself, do an action for one of his companies or he may pass and do nothing. If the player acts for himself, he may buy a private company or he may buy a new share and/or sell one or more currently held shares. If he does an action for his company, he may redeem a share or reissue shares. A player may also act to protect his company by using the Share Price Protection Rules. When the president does an action for his company, he may not do any other action for himself.

5.3.1 Buying Shares

When buying a share, a player may have a choice of shares from either the original offering or the open market.
Original offering shares are available at their original issue (par) price. These shares may be 10% shares or they may be the President's Certificate of a new company. See section 5.5 Starting A Company.
Reissued shares are available at their (new) par value. When reissued shares are purchased, the company receives the money for all reissued shares of that company sold that stock round at the end of the stock round.
Shares on the open market are available at their current market price.

5.3.2 Buying a Private Company

Instead of buying a share, a player may purchase a private company from another player or the Open Market.
When purchased from a player, the price paid for the private company can be any price negotiated between the two players (minimum $ 1). When purchased from the Open Market, the price will be the listed price on the Private Company.

5.3.3 Selling Shares

A player may sell a share or shares into the open market.
When a player sells a share or shares, he receives the current market price for them as indicated on the stock market when sales made by him occurred.
When shares are sold, inform the president(s) of the relevant railroad(s). The president of a company whose shares are sold may immediately buy them using share price protection rules. See rules section 5.9.
As shares are sold, adjust their token position on the stock market display down one level for each full share sold and not protected. Multiple shares sold by the same player during their stock round turn are sold into the open market at the price indicated by the share value token when that player's stock turn began. If a player sells more than one share in a company he must sell them in one block.
When a player sells shares in more than one company, he must specify in what order they are being sold.
Once a player has sold a share of a company, that player may not buy another share in that company from the initial offering or the open market until after the next set of operating rounds.

5.3.4 Selling to Buy Shares

If you sell a share or shares to raise money to buy a share (or shares), you may not then immediately sell that purchased share (or shares). You may not sell - buy - sell.

5.3.5 Buy/Sell Order

When buying a share, the player may buy a new share first and then sell held share(s) or he may sell held share(s) and then buy a new share.

5.4 Certificate Limits

5.4.1 Player Certificate Limits

Player Certificate Limits
Number of Players
Number of Companies		 3 4 5 6 7
10 20 16 13 11 9
9 17 14 11 9 7
8 15 12 9 8 6

The game certificate limit per player varies with the number of players and whether any companies have closed. At no time during a stock round may a player exceed his certificate limit. Note that certificates of companies whose share price token is in the yellow, green or brown section of the stock market do not count towards this total. Unless otherwise noted, private companies count as one certificate each.


The normal share limit per player in any one company is 60%. The position of the company share value token on the stock market, or the use of the Share Price Protection rules may allow a player to exceed this 60% limit.

5.4.2 Open Market

There may be no more than five shares (50%) of a particular company in the open market at any time. Players may not sell shares if by doing so they exceed this 50% limit.

5.5 Starting A New Company

To start a company a player must first buy the president's two share (20%) certificate and set the share par value at one of the values in the red outlined area ($ 68, $ 72, $ 76, $ 82, $ 90, $ 100).

5.5.1 Stock Market Tokens

The square company token is placed in the appropriate par value box on the stock market display to show the cost of shares from the initial offering. One of the company's round station tokens is placed on the appropriate par starting value box in the red outlined area on the stock market display. This station token becomes the share value token and indicates the value of the shares for purchases and sales to and from the open market.
If one or more share value tokens is already in this value box, this new token is placed below all the others.

5.5.2 Initial Shares Needed to Operate

A company must have six shares sold from the initial offering for it to commence operating (Exception: See 5.5.2.1). If a company does not have six shares sold at the start of an operating round, it does not operate and may not perform any actions listed under section B2 in the sequence of play.
If the company fails to operate, the company does not operate until its turn during the operating round in which the required number of shares have been sold from the initial offering. Shares required to commence operations may be owned by players or on the open market, they may not be in the initial offering.
A non-operating company's share value token is flipped over on the Stock Market and is not adjusted.
5.5.2.1 The St. Louis-San Francisco Railway
The St. Louis-San Francisco Railway may operate with fewer than six shares sold. It begins operations with only the president's 20% certificate sold.

5.5.3 Company Charter

When a company is started the current holder of the president's share takes the company charter as well as the remaining station tokens and places them in front of him. This charter is used to keep track of the various assets of the company.
The number and type of trains, any private companies owned and the number of shares redeemed is public knowledge and must be easily discernible through casual visual inspection. The amount of money in the corporate treasury may be kept secret by the current president, but must be stacked on top of the company charter. The charter, with the assets, is given to the new president if the company should change presidency.

5.5.4 Public Company Starting Treasury

A new public company receives as its initial treasury, 10 times its initial par value at the start of the stock round in which it was started.
Monies in public companies' treasuries must be kept separate from each other and from monies in player's hands.

5.6 Change of Presidency

If a player should acquire more shares in a company than the current president, either through his buying or the president selling, that player becomes the new president and assumes all responsibility for the railway.
This transfer of presidency may occur during an operating round.
The president of a company must always hold at least two shares of that company. The president may not sell any part of his remaining two shares unless there is both another player with two or more shares in that company, and space for at least one share on the open market. Providing that both these conditions are met, the president may sell share(s) up to the open market limit to reduce his total below that of another player who becomes the new president. If two other players should hold equal numbers of shares and both be eligible to become the new president, then the player closest to the left of the old president becomes the new president. The new president immediately trades two of his normal certificates with the old president for the presidential two share certificate. A presidential certificate once sold from the initial offering must always be held by a player, it may not be placed in the bank pool.

5.7 Initial Stock Round

The game starts with a special modified stock round. During this round no player may sell any certificate that he buys. Initially, the private companies are offered for sale in ascending cost order to each player, starting with the player with order card # 1 and proceeding clockwise around the table. While private companies are still available for sale, each player may, in turn, pass, bid on a higher value private company, or buy the lowest cost private company. Bids must always exceed the current cost or bid by at least $ 5. If a player has a bid on a company, he must set the bid amount aside until that company is sold.

If a company is bought and the next company that would normally be offered for sale has one bid on it, then that company is sold to the player who bid on it at the bid price. If two or more players have bid on the next company being offered, an auction is held starting with the bidding player to the left of the player with the highest bid. Only players who initially bid on the company for auction may participate. The company for auction goes to the player with the highest bid after all other participating players have passed. If the next company offered also has bid(s) on it, the same procedure is followed for it. Normal play then resumes with the player to the left of the player who bought the company that initiated the auction(s).

Should all players pass before the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad private company is sold, there is one operating round in which only the private companies run (note the St. Louis-San Francisco Railway is a public company) and the Great River Shipping Company, if still available for sale, is reduced in cost by five dollars. There is then a second initial stock round, following the rules above, starting with the player to the left of the last player to buy or bid, or with the first player in the last stock round if no player bought or bid.

If the Great River Shipping Company is reduced to a cost of $ 0 it is automatically sold to the first player it is offered to.

After the last private company is sold, the next player is offered his choice of the public companies as per the normal rules on starting a company. See section 5.5. Note that this will still be during the initial stock round, so shares bought may not be sold until the following stock round.

5.8 Token Movement on The Stock Market

5.8.1 Direction

If a share value token moves on the stock market, it will move in one of four directions.

5.8.2 Reasons for Movement

The share value token moves as indicated when any of the following events take place:

5.8.3 Arrows

Several boxes on the stock market contain arrows. These arrows indicate the share value token's direction of movement if the token is required to move left or right and is unable to do so because of the market edge or upper ledge.

5.8.4 Token Ordering in A Box

There can be two piles of tokens in a box; a pile of unoperated company tokens and a pile of operated company tokens.

If a share value token of an unoperated company is moved into a box where there are one or more tokens, the newly arriving token is placed below the other stock value tokens of unoperated companies that are already there. If a share value token of a company that has finished operating, is moved into a box where there are one or more tokens, the newly arriving token is placed below the other stock value tokens of companies that have finished operating, that are already there.

If a company declared a half dividend, the share price token stays in the same box but is moved to the bottom of the stack of operated company tokens.

5.9 Share Price Protection

When shares of a company are sold, the president may stop the fall in share price by purchasing them immediately from the selling player at full market price. As this is a private off market sale, the share price is not adjusted for share sales.
  1. The president is not required to use the 'Share Price Protection Rules'.
  2. Should the president elect to share price protect, he must buy all of the shares of his company being sold at this time by that selling player. The president must have the cash on hand for the shares and the space to hold the shares. He may not sell shares at this time to generate cash or make share room. If the president purchases the shares, he does so after the selling player has finished his stock buying/selling. It then becomes the president's stock phase and he purchases the share(s).
  3. During this special stock phase, the president may only buy shares, he may not sell shares to create space or raise cash.
  4. Play in the stock round then resumes with the player to the left of the last president to purchase shares. Note this may cause some players to miss their stock phase this round.
  5. If the selling player sells shares in two or more companies, he decides in which order he sells them. After he has finished his sales, the presidents of the companies he has sold shares in decide whether they wish to price protect them. If more than one of them purchase their shares(s), the stock round moves to the left of the purchasing president whose shares were sold last.
  6. The purchasing president may end up with more than 60% of the shares in his company through private purchases. He is allowed to keep this excess in share holdings until he sells one or more shares in this company, then he must sell enough shares to bring his holdings down to the 60% share limit.
  7. These rules are also in effect during forced sales. I.e., to buy a train.
  8. During the Stock Round, purchasing shares using the Share Price Protection rules is an action for purposes of changing the location of the priority card.
  9. When share sales cause a new president of a company, the new president may not share price protect the shares that were sold to mnake him the president.

5.10 Railroad Share Redemption

  1. An operating company may redeem its own shares from the open market or from player holdings.
  2. A company may hold a maximum of four shares and may only redeem a share if after redeeming, there would still be at least six shares in the hands of players or the open market. For an operating company there must always be at least six shares of a company held by players or the in open market.
  3. If a company wishes to redeem a share and there is a share of that company in the open market, it must redeem that share from the open market. If there are no shares in the open market, it may redeem a share from a player. It may redeem them from any player it wishes, but share redemptions may not cause a change in presidency.
  4. Share redemptions are not forced sales. A player may refuse to allow his share to be redeemed.
  5. Allowing a company to redeem one of your shares does not prevent a player from buying further shares in that company, nor does it change the market price.
  6. To redeem a share, the president during his stock turn, pays money out of the company treasury, to either the bank if the share is in the open market, or the player holding the share. The price paid is the current market value. As the player is acting for the railroad he may not do a stock action for himself that stock turn. Redemption of a share counts as a stock action and moves the location of the priority card.
  7. A Railroad may only redeem one share per complete stock round. Shares on the initial offering display, whether original issue or reissued may not be redeemed. A railroad may redeem a share in the same stock round that it reissued if it had enough money before it reissued.
  8. A newly formed company may not redeem a share in the stock round that it was floated as it has no money until the end of the stock round.
  9. Redeemed shares should be placed on top of the money in the treasury section of the railroad charter. The number of shares that a railway has redeemed is public knowledge.
  10. When the company has redeemed one or more shares, "All Shares Sold" refers only to unredeemed shares.

    5.11 Railroad Share Reissue

    A railroad may issue redeemed shares after the original initial offering has been sold out. During a game, a company may reissue as often as it wants to, but it may only reissue once per complete stock round.
    The new par value will be the higher of the old par value or 75% of the current market price rounded to the nearest available par price. Use the closest par value space on the stock market display (either higher or lower). All par values including the starting values ($ 68 to $ 100) and the grey values ($ 110 to $ 200) are available. The par value boxes from $ 76 to $ 200 each have a small number in brackets in them.
    This number is the minimum share value needed to be able to reissue at that price.
    The reissued shares are placed on the initial offerings display.
    The company will receive the money for these shares as they are sold. The company may not use this money until the end of that stock round.
    The reissuing of shares is a stock market action on behalf of the railroad.
    When a company reissues shares, it must reissue all the redeemed shares it holds.
    Table of Contents - Sequence of Play and Game Phases - Laying Track - Glossary
    Last Modified: November 12, 2003. Copyright 1999-2010. W.R.Dixon.
    Contact Bill Dixon designer.