Glossary

Shell corporation

Listed company with no significant operations.

A shell corporation is a public company, which has given up its operations and is possibly only managing its assets, or it is bankrupt and already free of debt. Shell corporations serve as a vehicle for an IPO of other companies. This form of the IPO is also called a reverse merger, reverse takeover, Reverse IPO or Back Door Listing. Some shell corporations are subject to lively, highly speculative trading. By doing this, the players involved aim to use a shell corporation to facilitate their own IPO.

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