IncomeDiary.com

How Pros Make Money Online

Income Diary

Who Owns Facebook? – The 10 Richest Facebook Shareholders

By:     Topics: Get Inspired     More posts about: ,

Facebook held its initial public offering (IPO) on Friday, May 18, 2012, raising $16 billion.

This made it the third-largest IPO in U.S. history, with a peak market capitalization of over $104 billion.

A huge step for a company, that famously was in no hurry to go public.

The IPO made the owners of Facebook rich. An estimated 1000 millionaires!

(Nearly 1/3 of the company’s workforce received a 7-figure payout.)

who owns facebook, who are largest facebook shareholders

Some Facebook Stats

Who Owns Facebook?

#1 Mark Zuckerberg – 29.3% – US $54.3 billion (March 2020)

Mark Zuckerberg (Founder and CEO) now owns 29.3 percent of Facebook’s Class A shares (NASDAQ: FB), compared to the time of the IPO, (which you can read in full here) when Zuckerberg owned 28.2% of Facebook.

This makes him Facebooks largest shareholder as well as being one of the world’s richest individuals. Real-Time Net Worth as of 4/28/21 $110.6B

[and No 5 in Forbes annual list of the world’s billionaires]

Here’s another little interesting fact about Facebook. Back in 2011, Zynga, the owner of social games such as FarmVille, was responsible for roughly 12% of Facebook’s earnings. That’s massive. Here’s a quote from Facebook’s IPO offering:

“We currently generate significant revenue as a result of our relationship with Zynga, and, if we are unable to successfully maintain this relationship, our financial results could be harmed.

In 2011, Zynga accounted for approximately 12% of our revenue, which amount was comprised of revenue derived from payments processing fees related to Zynga’s sales of virtual goods and from direct advertising purchased by Zynga. Additionally, Zynga’s apps generate a significant number of pages on which we display ads from other advertisers. If the use of Zynga games on our Platform declines, if Zynga launches games on or migrates games to competing platforms, or if we fail to maintain good relations with Zynga, we may lose Zynga as a significant Platform developer and our financial results may be adversely affected.”

That means that Zynga users spent $308M on Facebook in 2011, which is incredible when you consider what they sell.

A side note: Facebook is no longer so dependent on external relationships for revenue. For example, Facebook bought Instagram in 2012 for $1bn, and WhatsApp in 2014 for $19bn.

In addition, Facebook now owns the 4 most downloaded Apps: Facebook, Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and Instagram. These Apps have more than one billion users each.

With Mark’s Facebook money, you could buy…

  • 558 Gulfstream G550 private jets, at $50M each.
  • Antilla, the world’s most expensive home, 28 times.

(February 2022 – Mark Zuckerberg’s Net Worth Drops By $31 Billion)

blog divider

Create Your Own Success Story – Launch An Authority Site

“Barry

Ever wondered how a website like this makes money? Do you want to create a lucrative side income that grows into a substantial full-time income? This PDF Report explains how. A step-by-step guide to creating an authority site. Essential reading for anyone who is serious about turning their humble blog into an authority website.

To request your free copy CLICK HERE.

blog divider

#2 Jim Breyer & Accel Partners – 11.4% – $11.4 Billion

For those of you that don’t know, Jim Breyer is an American venture capitalist and partner of Accel Partners, which currently owns a solid 11.4% of Facebook, which for those of you who haven’t cottoned on to the maths yet, that’s roughly $11.4 Billion. In August 2010, Fortune Magazine named Breyer one of the 10 smartest people in technology, and you can see why. It’s his smart thinking and foresight into an incredible company, that has skyrocketed his wealth over the past few years. His previous success with earlier ventures ensured that there was enough money available to invest in the right company, at the right time. His firm Accel Partners owns the stake in Facebook, but he’s a very large part of the success and the face of the company.

With Jim’s Facebook money, you could buy…

  • 228 Gulfstream G550 private jets, at $50M each.
  • Antilla, the world’s most expensive home, 11 and a bit times.

#3 Dustin Moskovitz – 7.6% – $7.6 Billion

Dustin is just 8 days younger than Mark Zuckerberg, making him the youngest billionaire in the world. Dustin founded the site with Mark back at Harvard and holds on to a 7.6% stake of the company, which with this current valuation is likely to net him $7.6B. He left Facebook in 2008 to work on his own ventures, such as a mobile photo-sharing site, called Path (I’m sure you’ve heard about it lately), which has already turned down a $100 million offer from Google, and now serves over 2 million people. As good as that may well be, you can’t help but compare it to the likes of Facebook, which has grown rapidly in the 8 short years since it was created. Clearly, a force to be reckoned with.

With Dustin’s Facebook money, you could buy…

  • 152 Gulfstream G550 private jets, at $50M each.
  • Antilla, the world’s most expensive home, 7 and a bit times.

how to make money online

Essential tools for anyone who wants to make money online…

Like Facebook, successful entrepreneurs are constantly measuring their results. What works? What does not work!

If you are not doing that, you will never create a successful business. And when it comes to measuring your online success there are two essential tools you need. One is Google Analytics and the other is SEMRush

SEMRush is our favorite tool for checking how much traffic a website gets. Check out their Traffic Analytics tool – This is the best market competitive research tool on the market, allowing you to get estimations of any website’s traffic. It is perfect for spotting your rivals’ strengths and weaknesses and testing a fresh market or niche. If you are ready to use SEMRush then IncomeDiary readers can take advantage of a 14-Day PRO trial. [instead of the usual 7-day trial]

how to make money online

#4 Yuri Milner & Digital Sky Technologies – 5.4% – $5.4 Billion

DST was founded by Yuri Milner to focus solely on investments in the internet sector, where they have investments in Facebook, Zynga, and Groupon. They bought into Facebook with a $200 million investment in May 2009, based on a $10 Billion valuation. On top of that, they put another $100 million together to start buying employee’s shares to expand their stake in the company. In January 2011, they co-led an investment with Goldman Sachs of another $500 million based on a $50 billion dollar valuation. This has made them one of the largest shareholders in Facebook, and their stake in Zynga means that they’re making money from more than one source, seeing as Facebook users decided to spend $308 million on Zynga through Facebook alone last year. Ridiculous when you think about it.

With Yuri’s Facebook money, you could buy…

  • 108 Gulfstream G550 private jets, at $50M each.
  • Antilla, the world’s most expensive home, 5 times, with some spare cash left over for some fancy cars in the basement.

#5 Eduardo Saverin – 5% – $5 Billion

You might recognize the name if you’ve seen ‘The Social Network’, and that’s because Brazilian-born Eduardo Saverin played a key role in the company’s founding, back when he was roommates and best friends with Mark Zuckerberg. And if you’ve seen the film, you’ll know that their relationship went sour and that Eduardo actually used to own a third of the company, before it went down to 30% when Dustin Moskovitz came aboard. After some disputes between Mark and Eduardo about how the company was going to move forward, and whether Eduardo was going to remain as part of the Facebook team, he got pushed out of the company when a group of investors (including Peter Thiel from PayPal), got on board. After a series of legal disputes, Eduardo finally got his stake pushed back up to 5%, and even from such a small stake, he’s worth an incredible amount of money. There might be love lost between the two of them, but I wouldn’t turn my nose up at $5 Billion. 

Eduardo Saverin has also invested in early-stage startups such as Qwiki and Jumio. Today, this billionaire entrepreneur and angel investor is based in Singapore.

Want to know more about Eduardo Saverin?

Check out:

=> Life After Facebook

=> Bloomberg Billionaires Index

With Eduardo Saverin’s Facebook money, you could buy…

  • 100 Gulfstream G550 private jets, at $50M each.
  • Antilla, the world’s most expensive home, 5 times.

#6 Sean Parker – 4% – $4 Billion

Sean Parker is a name that many of you would have been familiar with since way before Facebook, due to his role in Napster, the peer2peer file-sharing program. When that eventually went sour and everyone tried to sue him, he walked away with an interesting reputation and a whole lot of knowledge. Sean got involved in Facebook when it was just five months old, becoming the company’s first president (aged 24) and helped the company to think big with the knowledge he had acquired from Napster and his role as an early advisor to Friendster (anyone remembers that?). He introduced the company’s first investor to Mark, in the form of Peter Thiel (PayPal Co-Founder), and was the one to implement features such as the photo-sharing function. In Mark’s own words, “Sean was pivotal in helping Facebook transform from a college project into a real company.”

He has other irons in the fire and has recently invested $15 M in Spotify, which is a rival to the new version of Napster, but none of that accounts towards the wealth that we’re looking at here today. With a 4% share in one of the fastest-growing and most profitable companies on the internet, he’s a sizeable part of something very special.

Recommended Sean Parker Read: The incredible life and career of Facebook’s first President!

With Sean’s Facebook money, you could buy…

  • 80 Gulfstream G550 private jets, at $50M each.
  • Antilla, the world’s most expensive home, 4 times.

#7 Peter Thiel – 2.5% – $2.5 Billion

As you hopefully read above, Peter experienced early success on the internet with PayPal, which he sold for $1.5B in 2002, which left him with some money to put to good use. He became the first investor in Facebook back in 2004 with a $500,000 investment for a 10.2% stake in the company. His share has been of course watered down in the past eight years as new investors have gotten on board, looking for a stake in the business. His business acumen and foresight for a small company, with plenty of competitors, has served him well as it’s one of the fastest-growing companies on the internet, with a value similar to that of McDonald’s.

With Peter’s Facebook money, you could buy…

  • 50 Gulfstream G550 private jets, at $50M each.
  • Antilla, the world’s most expensive home, 2 1/2 times.

#8 Microsoft – 1.3% – $1.3 Billion

Microsoft bought into Facebook right around the time that Li Ka-shing did below, paying $240 million for 1.6% of Facebook. Those shares have now been diluted somewhat, so their stake has come down to $1.3 billion, only earning them just over a billion dollars from their investment. Poor things. All jokes aside though, they had the money, and they saw the opportunity and potential so they took it. 2008, when they bought the stock, was an interesting time for Facebook, as it was only half the age it is now, and people were only just beginning to make the switch from other social networks.

I remember learning about Facebook in 2006, and I even opened an account, but I decided I didn’t like it and didn’t come back to it until the next year. It was only in about 2008, when the majority of my friends and I started to say goodbye to MySpace for good, and open up a Facebook account instead. Microsoft’s investment at this time meant that the company was already in a very strong position, but still had plenty of room to grow, which makes it a wise time to invest for any investor. If anyone can find out how much of Microsoft Bill Gates owns, I’d be very interested to know, because then you could see how much he personally owns of Facebook.

With Microsoft’s Facebook money, you could buy…

  • 26 Gulfstream G550 private jets, at $50M each.
  • Antilla, the world’s most expensive home once, with a bit of cash left over for soft furnishings.

#9 Chris Hughes – 1% – $1 Billion

Chris Hughes is the fourth roommate to Mark, Eduardo, and Dustin, from when they were back at Harvard, and that was how he got involved with Facebook. As well as a co-founder of Facebook, Chris was also in charge of the social media side of Barack Obama’s presidential campaign. He appeared on the cover of ‘Fast Company’ magazine, under the title  ”The Kid Who Made Obama President; How Facebook Cofounder Chris Hughes Unleashed Barack’s Base – and Changed Politics and Marketing Forever”. Now that’s a pretty bold statement to make about anyone, but it seems that Chris really did play a big part in promoting Obama, with his extensive knowledge of social media. I don’t know about you, but if I needed someone to help promote me through social media, I’d want one of the co-founders of Facebook too.

With Chris’s Facebook money, you could buy…

  • 20 Gulfstream G550 private jets, at $50M each.
  • Antilla, the world’s most expensive home, once. Still though, who really needs 2?

#10 Li Ka-shing – 0.8% – $800 Million

The Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing bought into Facebook in 2008, when the company had a valuation of around $15 billion and he only paid $120 Million. It sounds a bit ridiculous to say only when it’s an enormous amount of money, and only a very small percentage, but that very small percentage is now worth almost seven times what he paid for it, at $800 million. It makes you wonder what would happen now if you invested the same amount of money? I think that even back in 2008 there were plenty of investors who felt like they had already missed the boat when really, that was when Facebook really started to take off and secure itself as a giant of the internet.

With Li’s Facebook money, you could buy…

  • 16 Gulfstream G550 private jets, at $50M each.

Today, Facebook is much more than a Social Media company.

Rightly or wrongly in a world of Fake News, Facebook has become in my opinion the ultimate news organization.

Which of course is one of the reasons many people ask Who Owns Facebook?

Inspired by the FACEBOOK Success Story?

Recommended reading:

=> Finding early investment opportunities with companies like Facebook can be challenging for the average investor. An alternative to consider is Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs). This website will help you invest in the right company

=> 16 Things That Turn An Ordinary Blog Into An Authority Website

=> 20 Movies All Entrepreneurs Should Watch

=> The Truth About Being An Entrepreneur

=> How to change your life for the better – Do These Things

Comments

  1. Another Great post. I love your blog. Thanks for sharing.

  2. Cool article. It is incredible how much money Facebook is worth now. I agree that on paper you wonder how it’s worth $100bil and technically things might not add up but when companies go public they are often massively overvalued.

    • Josh Dunlop says

      I think that it makes investing now potentially quite risky, which is what I would be worried about as an investor.

  3. Kenny Fabre says

    Josh

    thank you for this list of facebook shareholders man. I initially thought that Mark Zuckerberg had full ownership rights to it.

    but the other shareholders are great as well

    • Josh Dunlop says

      Yeah it’s a lot of company to give away, but it’s definitely been the right decision.

  4. Brandon Halliburton says

    Excellent list. Love what you guys are doing on this website.

  5. before this, google conquer the world but now, facebook is taking place. honestly without facebook, idont know what will my friends will do right now..

    and mark zuckerberg really inspiring me 🙂

    • Josh Dunlop says

      Yeah Facebook is just one of those websites you keep open, and if you work from the computer, it’s hard to ignore it. I’m not married to it, I would even consider deleting it if I didn’t have fan pages to run.

  6. Rachna Kingston says

    Another awesome post Josh, very interesting and insightful 🙂

  7. Nice list here Josh and i always fall in love wit your write-ups about rich lists….

    I’m dreaming that one day my company will be listed as well and valued at billions of dollars which I am working towards.

    Sheyi

  8. Lovestorycritic1 says

    Another great article, Josh! I stumbled upon your amazing site via google. I couldn’t believe what a wealth of information I found on here. Keep up the great work. You actually inspired me to start my own website, one that focuses on reviews of love stories. Thank you!

  9. What an interesting read. Love your blog

  10. Mark is a genius.
    Funny thing is Google rates itself it’s website at an 8 while Facebook at 9 !!

  11. I am wondering why Mark Zuckerburg only has 28.4% stake in Facebook which he created and the main founder. That seems like bad business to give up so much equity. He could probably easily be voted out by others who leverage together and use their equity. Great post. I am glad I know this information to chat with others!

    • Josh Dunlop says

      He owns voting shares of around 60%, and he’s also the brains behind the website, so there would be no reason for people to get rid of him. He may be young, but it would be like voting Steve Jobs out of Apple (again) when he was still alive. As far as his equity goes, the company has needed money in the past to expand to the site it is now; don’t forget it serves 845 million people. Without these investments, this would never have happened, so it’s better for Mark to own 28.4% of something huge, than just another MySpace.

    • Michael Dunlop says

      Hi Abigail,

      You got to decide, would you prefer 28% of something huge, or 100% of something smaller.

      As for voting, Mark has 51% voting rights so that can’t happen.

  12. Utsav Trivedi says

    Really Loved and enjoyed to read this post

  13. WOW Josh, this post will go down as one of the best ones Ive ever read. Facebook might not be worth so much on paper, but the entire world is in their hands. Brands, people, friendships… They have become THE internet. Some companies are moving away from websites and are doing FB pages only. This must add to the value…

    In 4 more years, the valuation will be $200B and we will read this post somewhere in the archives, thinking… If only…

    Keep up the great week!

  14. Bryan Carlton says

    It is crazy how much just one website can be worth. Facebook has got some really smart people along with some brilliant business men now involved with it.

  15. Thanks for such a great info, I didn’t know that billgates is one of the shareholders nd the rest of them are young inlcuding Mark Zuckerberg. this kind of people are very inspiring.

  16. I love your blog. I think Mark deserves more than 28% anyway
    Thanks for this great post

  17. Wow, its a cool article. Can I post this on Facebook? 😀

We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you continue to use this site we will assume that you are happy with it.

Accept Read More