Tag: Ownership
Moving Beyond “Capitalism”
https://soundcloud.com/curioio/john-kay-moving-beyond/s-1dfFJ
I wish we would stop using the word Capitalism.
It is a 19th-century term, derived from 19th-century economic philosophy. But today people who would run...
Equity markets are thriving but are they relevant?
The equity markets with which we are familiar came into being in the 19th century to finance railways and railroads. Railways and railroads were...
Reflection on the Kay Review and corporate governance
John explains the one thing he'd do if he could now revise the Kay Review of UK Equity Markets and Long-term Decision Making and identifies ways to improve corporate governance.
The Investor Forum and Sports Direct
One of the principal recommendations of the Kay Review of equity markets, which reported in 2012 to Vince Cable, the Secretary of State for...
Modern business, modern markets
Our markets need to adapt to the changed nature of 21st century business if they are to remain relevant in a world in which capitalism has little need of capital.
Stakeholders with the most to lose should control struggling companies
When a corporation is unable to meet valid claims, control passes to the holders of these claims in a legally defined order of priority. But, as finance has grown more complex, these rules have come to look more shaky; they can falter dangerously in modern banking or in the case of a struggling retail business such as BHS.
Is it meaningful to talk about the ownership of companies?
Who owns a company? The answer is that no one does, any more than anyone owns the river Thames, the National Gallery, the streets of London, or the air we breathe. There are many different kinds of claims, contracts and obligations in modern economies, and only occasionally are these well described by the term ownership.
Let’s challenge our fixation on the principle of one share, one...
The Savoy Group and Google both adopted share structures that give individuals disproprtionately greater voting rights than their diverse set of shareholders. It has worked well for these companies and their investors over the long run. Perhaps we should reopen the debate over share structures?
Rail privatisation has delivered improvements through accountability and autonomy
Both the leading candidates for the leadership of Britain’s opposition Labour party have now committed themselves to renationalising the country’s railways. But the state-owned British Rail was one if the most reviled institutions in the UK, and privatisation has delivered many relative benefits.
Drug companies are built in labs, not boardrooms
The history of ICI and the British pharmaceutical industry may provide some pointers to show how shareholders and policymakers should react to Pfizer's bid for Astra Zeneca.
