Murdoch family succession drama, Benji case notes

 

Key glossary:

Fuggen Shluts; Catholic church; petrol sniffing/price at the pump; $2 spicy chicken wings; left wing nutjobs; Fox News channel (aka 'precious'); Homer Simpson 

Important precedents within Fox, Homer Simpson being fired by Germans:

https://youtu.be/68t74jofBD0?si=khXpfpoo9_h2E_FH

Previous layoffs at the precious: Shepherd Smith (gay); Roger Ailes (handsy); Lou Dobbs (innocent); Bill O'Reilly (innocent); Tucker Carlson (annoying girly laugh/innocent).

Rupert's concern: if other kids get controlling stake in the precious apart from Lachlan, precious could be sold off to fund pigskin factory for footballs. 

Other perspectives:

As per The Guardian 

But it won’t be Fox politics under discussion so much in Reno. Instead, much of that argument will be couched in an examination of US corporate governance conventions that allow for a family to control a business they do not majority own by a so-called dual class structure of shares – in effect the family shares have more power than others.

For example, Rupert Murdoch owns 17% of equity in the media empire and 39% of the voting power.

Dual structures are commonly used by company founders to retain control of a business even when they have a minority shareholding, with Murdoch holding 40% of voting rights via a 14% shareholding.

The Murdoch family’s hold over News Corp stems from a share structure consisting of voting and non-voting shares that gives the family a dominant voice over how the business is run.

In 2016, agitators including Hesta fell just short after delivering a 49.5% vote to eliminate the dual class system.

Mark Zuckerberg controls 61% of Meta Platforms via a 14% shareholding in the social media company that operates the Facebook and Instagram platforms, according to company disclosures.

Meta has a two-tiered system that gives shareholders one vote per “class A” share, and 10 votes per “class B” share. The billionaire chief executive owns more than 99% of class B shares.

 

Google has a similar structure that gives founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin a controlling 51% of voting rights of parent company Alphabet via a 12% shareholding.

Given Murdoch holds less than half of the voting rights, it is possible to change News Corp’s structure if agitators can gather an overwhelming protest vote. Doing so at Meta and Google can’t happen unless the founders support the changes.