TAKING STOCK OF CHAMETZ

Adapted
from a shiur by Dayan Yosef Greenwald

May one
own shares on Pesach in a public company that owns chametz?

At the
heart of this issue is the halachic view of corporations and stock ownership,
and whether shareholders, who don’t bear personal liability, are considered the
owners of corporate assets. These questions were first addressed by 19th
century CE poskim—the Bais Yitzchok, the Rogatchover Gaon, the Mahari
Halevi, and the Sho’el Umaishiv—in the context of banking. They considered such
questions as whether a depositor earning interest at a corporate-owned bank
with Jewish shareholders is considered a malveh b’ribbis.

Melamed
L’ho’il 1:91 discusses at length why corporate-owned chametz with Jewish
shareholders isn’t subject to chametz she’avar alav haPesach.
Mo’adim Uz’manim (Vol. 3 269), who completely rejects the notion that corporate
ownership is distinct from personal ownership, rules that shares of stock in
chametz-owning corporations must be sold to a non-Jew along with one’s physical
chametz.