Market Cap — Small, Mid, and Large

How Big Is This Company, Really?

A $50 stock price doesn't tell you much about a company's size. A $50 stock could be a tiny startup or a giant corporation — it depends on how many shares exist.

Market cap fixes that. It's the most honest way to measure a company's size.

Market Cap = Share Price × Total Shares Outstanding

If a company has 1 billion shares at $50 each, its market cap is $50 billion.

The Three Tiers

Large-Cap ($10B+)

• The household names: Apple, Microsoft, JPMorgan, Walmart
• Stable, profitable, often pay dividends
• Lower growth, but lower risk
• Hard to double your money quickly — but hard to lose it all

Mid-Cap ($2B–$10B)

• Growing companies still climbing the ladder
• More room to run than large-caps
• More volatile, more news-sensitive
• Often the sweet spot for growth investors

Small-Cap ($300M–$2B)

• Smaller, less-known companies
• Can double or triple in a year — or lose 50%
• Often under-researched, so there's more opportunity (and risk)
• Highly volatile

(There are also Micro-caps and Mega-caps at the extremes — but the big three tiers are what you'll use most.)

FSL Strategy by Cap

• All large-caps → Safe, steady, but unlikely to win the league
• All small-caps → Could win big or crash hard
• Balanced mix → The typical winning approach

Think of your draft like investing real money: a foundation of large-caps, some mid-cap growth, and a couple of small-cap lottery tickets.