I think some are making the question something other than what it was. Ameritrade, as like a lot of others, is there to make money out of your trading. I am sure that the third floor janitor feels bad when you lose money and dances in the halls when you make money ... Yeah, that is the ticket.
The question is about certificated shares of a stock. Like I said, it is a risk game. The broker is not going to fence your certificates until sure that it is real, has value, and is not going to cause him the loss of sleep.
Had HLNT deposited those shares into your brokerage account years ago, it would be an irrelevant question, but Opie preferred to issue certificates, so direct investors got a better price than the market was offering, he got cash to pay for his trip to the Islands with his Ukrainian sweety and the investor got this neat certificate. Could it be that certificate holders just need to find a proper sized frame to be able to hang the shares on your wall next to your sheet of two dollar bills that you will never spend? Or maybe that is $3.00 bills?
In any event, either you have shares in your brokerage account or you do not ... If you do then you can dump them at any moment. Otherwise ...
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