Facebook’s reputation has suffered in recent years due to a series of high-profile scandals. But the parent company has renamed itself Meta, in what many see as an attempt to distance itself from the negativity.
The rebrand raises a number of intriguing questions, such as: B. Who owns Facebook now? We’ll answer that question in this article, while also taking a brief trip back in time to find out how we got here.
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From Facebook to Meta
In 2004, Harvard students Mark Zuckerberg, Eduardo Saverin, Dustin Moskovitz, and Chris Hughes founded Facebook. Facebook’s popularity grew rapidly and by the end of 2004 had surpassed one million active users.
In 2012, Facebook applied to become a public company and its initial public offering (IPO) cost $38 per share. The IPO raised the company approximately $16 billion, which is worth over $100 billion.
After a string of serious scandals, Facebook wiped clean (or tried) with a rebrand. As of October 2021, Facebook’s parent company would be known as Meta, according to CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
Of course, the roadmap above is just a condensed version of Facebook’s history. For a more in-depth look, see our coverage of the evolution of Facebook to Meta.
Who Owns Facebook Now?
By doing Statement on the announcement of the renaming the company clarified to Meta that Facebook’s corporate structure would remain the same. That means the same controlling interests that held controlling interests in Facebook would also be responsible for Meta. So who are the controlling majority shareholders of Facebook who are now in charge of Meta?
Facebook’s share structure differs from that of other publicly traded companies, which allocate one vote to one share. Facebook is unique in that it has a “dual class” share structure that separates Facebook stock into two classes, namely “Class A” and “Class B” shares. This is acc SEC Filings by the company.
Class A shares are what regular investors can buy on the stock exchange and they have one vote per share. Class B shares, owned primarily by Mark Zuckerberg and a small group of insiders, each have 10 votes.
Mutual funds and other large institutional investors own a significant amount of Facebook stock. Accordingly CNN business, mutual funds currently own about 41% of Facebook’s publicly traded stock, with Vanguard Group and Fidelity Management taking the lead. Individual Facebook shareholders own less than 2% of the company’s total stock.
Zuckerberg owns around 13% of Meta stock, Bloomberg Notes. Despite their low volume, these provide him with the required majority of votes.
Why was Facebook renamed Meta?
Facebook’s rebranding happened because the brand grew beyond the identity it had become known for.
With Facebook’s foray into virtual reality with the Facebook Metaverse, the company feels the Meta moniker will be a more appropriate identity for its ambitions. In the Metaverse, even users without a Facebook account can access products and interact with others virtually.
It must be noted that the social media platform Facebook will keep its name, as will WhatsApp and Instagram. All other companies owned by Facebook now become subsidiaries of Meta, the parent company.
Zuckerberg still (largely) owns meta
The governance structure of Facebook, or Meta as it’s now known, remains unchanged despite the renaming. Zuckerberg still maintains his iron grip on Facebook with his Class B majority of shares.
Zuckerberg will remain in charge of Facebook until he sells his stock or until the stock’s power is diluted. The meta rebrand is a name change, but not much more.
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