Courts in California and New York maintain that while contracts with unregistered entities may hold validity, the unregistered status limits available legal remedies. This creates an unbalanced risk scenario - registered businesses often find themselves at a disadvantage when seeking to enforce their rights.
Walmart is a good example of a trade name. Walmart's trade name is just Walmart—that's the name it uses on its advertising and website, and what most people refer to it as. However, its legal name, which appears on all of its business paperwork (corporation filings, taxes, compliance, etc.) is Wal-Mart Inc.
If a business owner wants to operate under a different name other than the company's legal name, they can use a trade name instead. A trade name does not need to include additional words or legal phrases (e.g., Corp, LLC, etc.).
A trade name is simply the name of your business. Some people refer to them as “business names,” “company names,” “doing business as names,” “DBA names,” or “fictitious names.” • You register your trade names with your state to conduct business there.
A trade name, trading name, or business name is a pseudonym used by companies that do not operate under their registered company name. The term for this type of alternative name is fictitious business name. Registering the fictitious name with a relevant government body is often required.