Stock splits are easy to track online

— -- Q: Is there an easy way to see when a stock has split in the past and by how much?

A: The dollar price of a share of stock doesn't mean much. Whether a stock is trading for $5 or $5,000 doesn't tell you anything.

What does matter is the company's market value, or value of the entire company in the eyes of investors. And that's calculated by multiplying the per-share price of the stock by the number of shares outstanding.

Some companies have decided over the years to split their stock to keep the per-share price affordable. So, if a company is trading for $100 a share, it might decide to cut its stock price in half and by giving shareholders a second share of stock for every share they own. The value of investors' holdings stays the same, and the value of the company is the same, but the share price may seem less scary to some investors. Or so the thinking goes.

There has been somewhat of a backlash against stock splits as of late, as I describe in this story.

I've also written repeatedly why stock splits are a non-issue for investors.

Another place to get this information is MSN Investor at moneycentral.msn.com/investor. Enter the stock's symbol in the upper left-hand corner and click the Get Quote button. Click on Historical under Charts and you will see a chart. If this is the first time that you've used this website, you may have to install a small program to get advanced charts. If so, you will see a small link telling you how to do this in the upper right-hand corner of the chart.

You can customize this chart to add a small box indicating previous splits. If you put your mouse over the box, you will see the amount of the splits, such as a 2-for-1 or 3-for-1 for instance.

Matt Krantz is a financial markets reporter at USA TODAY and author of Investing Online for Dummies. He answers a different reader question every weekday in his Ask Matt column at money.usatoday.com. To submit a question, e-mail Matt at mkrantz@usatoday.com. Click here to see previous Ask Matt columns.