Money or capital which an individual or a firm employs in
   business; fund; in the United States, the capital of a bank or other
   company, in the form of transferable shares, each of a certain amount;
   money funded in government securities, called also the public funds; in
   the plural, property consisting of shares in joint-stock companies, or
   in the obligations of a government for its funded debt; -- so in the
   United States, but in England the latter only are called stocks, and
   the former shares.