what is k 
k is added to the end of a nasdaq stock ticker when the shares offer no voting rights the letter k is one of many nasdaq ticker symbol extensions that tell investors various things about that particular stock k is also the ticker symbol of the kellogg company listed on the new york stock exchange nyse understanding kthere are currently few stocks with no voting rights in the market because investors tend to shun such assets these stocks typically trade at a discount to their counterparts that do have voting rights a shareholder vote is considered a fundamental right for investors 2 without voting rights shareholders generally feel that they are vulnerable to arbitrary or irrational business decisions by management in cases where a lot of trust is placed in management because it has historically delivered significant shareholder value over a long stretch of time shareholders may not mind holding k shares other extensions including nyseon the nasdaq a d at the end of a ticker represents a corporate reorganization 3 the letter t represents a security with warrants or rights 4 w is for warrants 5z and l are more ambiguous and could mean multiple things but are usually tied to some preferred security 67p o n and m signify whether a security is a first second third or fourth preferred issue respectively 8910more common extensions include a and b these represent class a or class b shares 1112depending on the trading or charting platform or data source extensions may be directly added to the other ticker symbol characters or they may be separated by a for example brk a and brk b are the class a and class b shares of berkshire hathaway inc listed on the nyse 1314 in this case the class bs are non voting shares the nyse also has extensions or identifiers example of k shares in the real worldthe non voting shares for liberty global plc lbtyk is an example of a stock that has had longevity because of a single man john malone a pioneer in the cable industry who has a faithful following of shareholders he was a former ceo of the company and is presently chair of the board 15 the k shares tend to slightly underperform the lbtya shares which are class a voting shares 1617if shareholder sentiment about management is less clear a responsible firm would take action to eliminate a class of shares with no voting rights if it already had such a class this occurred with comcast corporation cmsca whose ceo brian roberts does not enjoy the same elevated status as john malone in the cable industry in december 2015 one share of cmcsk converted into one share of cmcsa which has voting rights shareholders applauded the move 18