The network of global corporate control

Auteurs : Stefania Vitali, James B. Glattfelder, Stefano Battiston

PLoS ONE 6(10), e25995 (2011)
arXiv: 1107.5728v1 - DOI (q-fin.GN)
Soumis à arXiv le 28 Jul. 2011
Résumé scientifique

The structure of the control network of transnational corporations affects global market competition and financial stability. So far, only small national samples were studied and there was no appropriate methodology to assess control globally. We present the first investigation of the architecture of the international ownership network, along with the computation of the control held by each global player. We find that transnational corporations form a giant bow-tie structure and that a large portion of control flows to a small tightly-knit core of financial institutions. This core can be seen as an economic "super-entity" that raises new important issues both for researchers and policy makers.

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Les travaux antérieurs sur lesquels il s’appuie

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    E. Dietzenbacher, U. Temurshoev · 2008 · Journal of Economics · cité 51 fois · Pas encore résumé
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    The direct ownership structure in a sector can be readily obtained from data on shareholding. Due to cross-shareholding, however, the true ownership structure may be hidden by a complex network of indirect relations. In studying the property structure, two important aspects are the size of the relations between primary owners (e.g. individuals) and secondary owners (e.g. companies), and the distance between them. The distance is obtained from the average number of secondary owners via whom the relation runs. As an empirical application, we study the banking sector in the Czech Republic, where also the relation between distance and separation of dividend and control rights is discussed.

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