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by peisistratos 2544 days ago
What does "secretly owned" mean?

The #2 company on the Fortune 500 is Exxon-Mobil. Who owns it? There are some limited disclosures in various places, but this is the same as Chinese firms. Exxon-Mobil is "secretly owned". What hypocrisy these western magazines have. Computer Weekly, owned by Reed Elsevier RELX makes a small fortune privatizing publication of publicly funded research. Who is behind that? Who knows? It is as much "secretly owned" as any Chinese company.

1 comments

As I said, there are limited disclosures, just like the Chinese. In this case meaningless - I ask who owns this and you say "Blackrock" and "Northern Trust" as if you've answered the question. "Northern Trust" is not a who, it is just another layer of "secret ownership" to use the magazine's phraseology. I still have no idea who owns Exxon-Mobil - it is a secret, to use their phrase.