The Float and the Lockup: Who Can Actually Sell

Shares outstanding is one number. The float, the shares actually free to trade, is another, and in micro-caps the gap between them decides how a stock moves.

In this episode, Atlas and Michael close the share-count arc. What the float really is, and why insider blocks, restricted stock, and locked shares sit outside it. How a lockup expiration puts a date on the calendar, months in advance, when frozen shares become free to sell, disclosed right there in the offering documents. And why a tiny float makes a stock violent in both directions: scarcity that fuels a spike on the way up, and no support underneath on the way down, which is exactly the setup a company uses to quietly dilute into strength.

The last piece of the puzzle is not how many shares exist, or how many could exist. It is which shares can actually change hands today, and when the locked ones get set loose.

Shares outstanding tells you how many shares exist. The float tells you how many can actually trade.

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