The Effects of Globalization on Capital

This project studies capital ownership. “The Swedish Ownership model”, which until just recently dominated the stock market, is characterized by ownership limited to one or two owners. Usually, but not always, these owners have been Swedish families. The concentration of control was made possible through a growing divergence between control rights (vote shares) and dividends rights (capital shares) for the dominating owners. Another common feature has been that a family or group of owners through investment firms and box-in-box ownership has dominating influence in several firms. Sweden is currently in the middle of a structural change where the Swedish ownership model is clearly in decline because it is at least in part being replaced by other models of corporate management. An important driving factor behind this development is the globalization of ownership.