Something those of us invested directly or indirectly to consider:
Recently I have read a couple of articles referring to the risk of state regulation or even forced break-up of vast monopolistic companies like FB GOOGL and AMZN for that reason, or state security, tax-gathering, or simply that they are beyond the control or understanding of most politicians which, of course, pols. simply cannot abide.
Would certainly be interested in ‘the view of the board’ on this threat.
Hi Strelna
We’ve seen it before and certainly for break ups it isn’t necessarily a death knell for a company - it could even be a path to further gains as separated units.
On the ones you have listed, i actually think the lack of understanding is delaying intervention rather than accelerating it. I’m not sure about Facebook but I would think Amazon would be first in line for a break up of a monopoly - maybe 10-20 year timescale whilst the threat to Google (and to a lesser extent FB) could be more regulatory interference and oversight.
Google and Amazon I guess could run the risk of fines for cross subsidising units - like AWS subsidising ecommerce that puts retailers out of business or Google search cross subsidises Google self driving cars that puts Ford out of business.
If they started to exert a monopolistic bundling then again fines could ensue (like Microsoft and Qualcomm).
Ant