Except they didn’t. Whomever [sic] purchased the stock initially did, and often that amount is a shadow of what the stock is currently traded at.
This ignores two other very important roles that subsequent shareholders play:
- Give initial investors the opportunity re-deploy their capital elsewhere when they choose to do so.
- Signal the value of the company’s equity, in real time, on the open market. When the stock is trading above IPO price (as your rebuttal implies), this enables the company to raise more capital by borrowing against its equity and/or selling shares of its own stock.
In light of these critical roles, it’s vastly unfair to say that shareholders contribute nothing to the delivery of goods and services—quite the opposite.
this enables the company to raise more capital by borrowing against its equity
You can always get asset backed loans, even as a company, why should we be welfare for businesses?
Also you would need an uncaptured market for anything you said to even have an effect, when 90% of trades are completed off market not effecting the price on the tape are we really doing anything but getting fleeced by market makers? You aren’t signaling anything when your trade data is being bought and hidden from the market using PFOF techniques.
In light of the objective failures of our market it’s extremely fair to say shareholders have no contribution to the delivery of goods and services. Could they in a perfect market sure, but I could have everything in utopia, to bad that doesn’t exist.
Okay, I’m not getting into a debate about organizational behaviour, economics and finance with an unarmed person.
Good day to you sir/madam.
For the kids reading at home, this is what an ad hominem attack looks like—a logical fallacy in which one attacks their opponent personally instead of addressing the merits of their argument.
