A common shortcut is to treat Zakat on shares as 2.5% of whatever they're worth today. That's the right rate, applied to the wrong number — a share represents partial ownership of a company with its own mix of cash, debt, inventory, and fixed assets, and only part of that mix is actually zakatable. AAOIFI Shari'a Standard No. 35 lays out exactly how to isolate that part, and it's what Sanad's Zakat calculator uses.
Investment shares vs. trading shares
The standard draws a line based on why you're holding the stock. If you bought it to resell for a short-term profit — trading inventory, in effect — the full market value is zakatable, the same as cash. If you're holding it as a long-term investment in the company itself, only the company's own zakatable assets count, not its full market value. Sanad's calculator asks which purpose applies, since the two produce very different numbers.
The precise method
For investment shares, Sanad takes the company's most recently reported balance sheet and adds up its cash and cash equivalents, short-term investments, receivables, and inventory — the assets Zakat actually applies to. Dividing that by the company's market capitalization gives a zakatable-asset ratio, which is then applied to the market value of the shares you hold. A company sitting on a lot of cash and little debt will have a higher ratio than a capital-intensive one with most of its value tied up in factories and equipment.
The quick method — a real fallback, not a guess
Not every company's cached balance sheet has a clean breakdown of current assets. When the precise ratio isn't available, Sanad falls back to the 25% proxy that AAOIFI Standard No. 35 itself permits as a simplified estimate of a typical company's zakatable-asset share. Sanad always shows which method — precise or quick — produced the figure you're looking at, rather than presenting an estimate as if it were exact.
Why crypto doesn't get this treatment
A coin isn't a share in a company with a balance sheet to pull apart — it's valued the way cash or trade goods are. So Sanad treats the full market value of any crypto held as zakatable, with no ratio applied, same 2.5% rate. See why crypto can't be screened like a stock for the same reasoning applied to compliance screening instead of Zakat.
Nisab: the threshold, not just the rate
Zakat is only due once your total zakatable wealth clears Nisab — traditionally the value of 85 grams of gold. Rather than hardcoding a figure that goes stale, Sanad pulls a live gold price each time the calculator runs, so the threshold moves with the market the same way your holdings do.
An estimate, not a personal fatwa
Sanad's figure is calculated from each company's own reported financials and a live gold price — it doesn't know about your other assets, debts, or what you already paid Zakat on elsewhere. Your actual obligation should be calculated against your full wealth on your own Zakat due date — consult a qualified scholar for your specific situation.