One correct answer has always been: not much. Since the company went public in 2004, its stock has come in two flavors: Class A shares, which come with one vote apiece; and Class B shares, which come with 10. The latter are held almost entirely by Google’s founders, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, giving them majority control of the company while owning just a fraction of it. If all the Class A shareholders voted against Page and Brin, they would still lose. So it might even be accurate to say that the value of those voting rights is tantamount to nothing.
Today we are learning that the answer can even be: literally less than nothing. Or, to put it differently, an investor will apparently pay you to take the burden of a Google vote off her hands. The cause: a new C class of Google stock without a vote. ]]>
In buying Apple shares last year, when the stock was heading for seven hundred dollars, investors were willfully ignoring the law of large numbers and the laws of supply and demand.]]>
(The company's profit margin was modestly higher than expected. And the stock is likely benefitting from some short-covering, as Amazon bears panic and cover their bets). Gotta love Amazon. And the stock market. (The "bears", by the way, would have short-sold stock - having sold a ton at a higher price, and promising to buy it back at a lower price; sell high, buy low, make profit. When the stock didn't fall, they had to buy it anyway to cover their debts from "selling" at the higher price.)]]>
The algorithm could be of great interest to Twitter, which could charge a premium for ads linked to popular topics, but it also represents a new approach to statistical analysis that could, in theory, apply to any quantity that varies over time: the duration of a bus ride, ticket sales for films, maybe even stock prices. Oooo.]]>
A classic example of why stock buybacks are always a sign of management losing its focus. ]]>