With the next class of securities, registered stocks and shares, by far the greatest number of Stock Exchange dealings are concerned. In this class are included nearly the whole of the securities issued by the joint stock companies. The distinctive features of a registered security are that it is transferable only by a separate conveyance or transfer, and that no holder has a legal title to the security until his name has been registered as the holder in the books of the company. On the registration of the holder, the company issues a certificate as evidence of his title in the manner described in a previous chapter. Stocks which are neither inscribed nor registered frequently take the form of bonds to bearer. A large number of foreign loans are issued in this form, as also are a large number of the stocks of the American railroads. These bonds to bearer pass from hand to hand in exchange for money after the manner of bank-notes. They are a very convenient form of security, but, at the same time, somewhat dangerous, as in case of loss or destruction the holder has, of course, no means of proving that he is the rightful owner. In this they resemble bank-notes, but they differ from them in the fact that their currency is recognised in only a narrow circle, and in that they, of course, bear interest. The Government or the company which issues them has no means of knowing in whose hands these bonds may be at the moment, and therefore it cannot remit the interest payments as they become due. It is left for the holder to apply for these payments, and this he does by presenting one of the large number of coupons attached to each bond, each bearing the date of one payment. Besides the coupons there is often attached to the bond a "talon," enabling the holder to demand a fresh set of coupons when his supply is in due course exhausted.