When trading stocks and say I purchase 10 shares of Facebook, do I actually own ten shares of Facebook? Of the stock trading platform is a separate entity from actual buying and selling of stock?
Depends on the instrument you are trading. For equities, in general, yes you do own a part of the company. Even in equities there are different types (Google for "Types of Equities") for differences.
For equity derivatives (eg CFDs) no you don't .
