The individuals or legal entities that own shares are called shareholders of the company. But the rights of shareholders are not the same. The most significant rights belong to majority shareholders - owners of large blocks of shares, who have the right to take part in the management of the company.
Majority shareholders, or majority shareholders, are the largest, main shareholders of the company. The name itself comes from the word majorité, which means "majority" in French. This word became the basis for the term majoritaire, which has passed into other languages. Accordingly, the word "minority" is derived from the word minorité - a minority. Sometimes, for brevity, these two groups of shareholders are called majors and minors, but these names are more of a professional slang.
Majority shareholders in the general classification of shareholders
According to the generally accepted classification, which can be found in any textbook of economics, there are four categories of shareholders.
1. The only one. This is a person (natural or legal) who owns 100% of the company's shares, that is, controls the entire capital of the joint-stock company.
2. Majority. These are large shareholders, whose shareholdings allow them to participate in the management of the joint-stock company.
3. Minority. The blocks of shares of these persons are quite large, sometimes worth hundreds and millions of dollars. But the share in the company is not very large (for example, 1%). Minority shareholders are given some rights (for example, to collect information about the financial condition of the company), but they do not participate in the management of the company.
4. Retail. These are small shareholders entitled only to receive dividends.
Majority and minority shareholders are considered the main categories of shareholders - sometimes only them are singled out. After all, the only shareholder is, in fact, just the only majority shareholder of the company. And retail shareholders are small minority shareholders.
The main border of interests lies between the majority and minority shareholders: the former are most often interested in the growth of the company's value, expressed in the value of their blocks of shares, and the latter, in dividends. This conflict of interest is classic.
How many percent of shares does the majority shareholder have?
Where is the border between these two categories of shareholders, between majority and minority shareholders? There is no clear border, since everything depends on the charter of a particular company, which determines the minimum threshold for majority shareholdings. Much depends on how large the shareholdings of other shareholders are.
As a rule, majority shareholders include persons who control such a block of shares, which allows them, according to the charter of a joint-stock company, to exercise certain rights to manage the company. At a minimum - to participate in the election of the board of directors
The majority shareholder can be an individual (individual), and entire companies, as well as investment funds.
The influence of a majority shareholder depends on the percentage of shares that he owns. Blocking blocks of shares have a special weight - their owners can veto the decision of the board of directors. In theory, 25% + 1 share is considered a blocking stake, but in reality the percentage may be lower.
If the majority shareholder has 50% +1 share, he is considered the owner of an unconditional controlling stake (the size of the controlling stake may be less, for example, 20-30%). The charters of some companies allow in such cases to manage the organization alone. But the larger the company, the higher the weight of other majority shareholders. In many joint-stock companies, even the owner of a controlling stake has to reckon with the voting of the majority shareholders, because even a 5% stake in a giant company can be worth billions of dollars!
