Thursday, 15 November 2012

Barclays Bank leads global capitalism pack


Barclays Bank leads a core of 737 transnational companies (TNCs) that are holding the world’s economy at ransom, a study by three Swish economic researchers reveals.

A TNC, according to the Organisation of Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) is a firm which ‘comprise companies and other entities established in more than one country and so linked that they may co-ordinate their operations in various ways’. 

The study titled The Network of Global Corporate Control done by Stefani Vitali, James Glattfelder and Stefano Battiston of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich released last year confirms the existence of a cartel driving global capitalism by its involvement in activities which undermine the global economy.

The 747 TNCs own or control, through shareholding, 80% of businesses while another core of 147 TNCs which the researchers call the ‘super entity’ owns or controls 40% of businesses.

Leading this super entity’s top 10 is Barclays Bank followed by Capital Group Companies Inc, FMR Corporation, AXA, State Street Corporation, JP Morgan Chase & Co, Legal & General Group plc, Vanguard Group Inc, UBS AG and Merrill Lynch & Co Inc.

This is the super entity to which the researchers say ‘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,” the researchers say in their abstract.

“The structure of the control network of transnational corporations affects global market competition and financial stability,” they point out.

The study shows 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,” they further say.

Vitali, Glattfelder and Battiston describe the bow-tie structure as one made up of ‘strongly connected component’ of TNCs which own ‘directly and/or indirectly shares in every other member’.

Such a structure is a means of ‘preventing take-overs, reducing transaction costs, risk sharing and increasing trust between groups of interest’.

The researchers also note that this structure ‘weakens market competition, reduces over-all employment and leads to excessive pricing’. 

Some of the companies are involved in illegal arms deals, food speculation to push up prices and, according to CorpWatch founder Joshua Karliner, ‘have become some of the most powerful economic and political entities in the world today’.

CorpWatch is an organisation which ‘investigates and exposes corporate violations of human rights, environmental crimes, fraud and corruption around the world’.

In his 1997 book, The Corporate Planet: Ecology and Politics in the Age of Globalization, Karliner says more than half TNCs come from just five nations: France, Germany, the Netherlands, Japan and the United States.  

“But,” he states, “despite their growing numbers, power is concentrated at the top. That accounts for one-quarter of the world’s productive assets.” 

Below are some of the activities the TNCs engage in:

·       Account for the world’s industrial capacity, technological knowledge, international financial transactions and power

·       They control mining, refine and distribute most of the world’s oil, gas, diesel and jet fuel

·       They built most of the world’s oil, gas, coal, hydroelectric and nuclear power plants

·       They extract most of the world’s minerals, manufacture and sell most of the world’s cars, aeroplanes, communications satellites, computers, home electronics, chemicals, medicines and biotechnology products. 

Transnational corporations hold 90% of all technology and product patents worldwide and are involved in 70% of world trade. More than 30% of this trade is ‘intra- firm’ which means it occurs between units of the same corporation
  
·       They harvest much of the world’s wood and make most of its paper

·       They grow many of the world’s major agricultural crops and process much of it

·       They work together with their governments to reorganize the world economic structures and balance of power through a series of intergovernmental trade and investment accords. The treats serve as frameworks for globalisation

·       They work to circumvent national government because most border and regulatory agencies are succumbing to the power and influence of TNCs. As a result, most TNCs are stateless and cannot be accountable to any government

·       They influence both domestic and foreign policies

The list of 50 top TNCs
1 Barclays Plc, Great Britain
2 Capital Group Companies Inc, US
3 FMR Corp, US
4 AXA, France
5 State Street Corporation, US
6 JP Morgan Chase & Co, US
7 Legal & General Group Plc, Great Britain
8 Vanguard Group, Inc., US
9 UBS AG China
10 Merrill Lynch & Co., Inc. US
11 Wellington Management Co. L.L.P, US
12 Deutsche Bank AG Germany
13 Franklin Resources, Inc., US
14 Credit Suisse Group, China
15 Walton Enterprises LLC, US
16 Bank of New York Mellon Corp., US
17 Natixis, France
18 Goldman Sachs Group, Inc., US
19 T. Roweprice Group, Inc., US
20 Legg Mason, Inc., US
21 Morgan Stanley, US
22 Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, Inc. Japan
23 Northern Trust Corporation, US
24 Société Générale, France
25 Bank OF America Corporation, US
26 Lloyds TSB Group plc, Great Britain
27 Invesco Plc, Great Britain
28 Allianzse, Germany
29 TIAA, US
30 Old Mutual Public Limited Company, Great Britain
31 Aviva plc, Great Britain
32 Schroders Plc, Great Britain
33 Dodge & Cox, US
34 Lehman Brothers Holdings, US
35 Sun Life Financial, Canada
36 Standard Life Plc, Great Britain
37 CNCE, France
38 Nomura Holdings, Inc, Japan
39 The Depository Trust Company, US
40 Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance, US
41 Inggroep N.V.  Netherlands
42 Brandes Investment Partners, L.P, US
43 Unicredito Italiano, Spain
44 Deposit Insurance Corporation of Japan
45 Vereniging Aegon, Netherlands
46 BNP Paribas, France
47 Affiliated Managers Group, Inc, US
48 Resona Holdings, Inc, Japan
49 Capital Group International, Inc, US
50 China Petrochemical Group Co.  Canada

Sources: planetsave and helaxendria

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