Last Updated on November 11, 2022 by Emmanuel
In 2004, Mark Zuckerberg and his four colleagues founded Facebook while studying at the famous Harvard University and were roommates.
By the time Facebook went public in 2012, Zuckerberg had owned 25% of the company, and that stake is now worth over $100 billion.
So, how did Mark Zuckerberg manage to own 25% of Facebook?
Mark Zuckerberg Early Life
This visionary entrepreneur was born on May 14, 1984, in White Plains, New York, to a dentist father and a psychiatrist mother.
He has three sisters: Arielle, Donna, and Randi. When Mark was young, his family lived in Dobbs Ferry, New York.
As a youngster, Mark loved making computer programs, and he created a music player called the Synapse Media Player in middle school.
Synapse Media Player used artificial intelligence to learn the users’ taste in music and create playlists accordingly.
Microsoft Corporation had so attracted to the program that it offered to buy it for $1 million when Mark was only 15 years old.
From Harvard to Silicon Valley
When Mark Zuckerberg first started Facebook in 2004, it was simply a way for him and his Harvard classmates to stay connected.
Little did he know that his social networking site would grow to become one of the most valuable companies globally.
So how did Zuckerberg go from being a college student to becoming one of the wealthiest individuals worldwide?
For starters, Mark had a lot of help from his co-founders, Eduardo Saverin and Dustin Moskovitz.
They were instrumental in getting Facebook off the ground, especially in those early days when they were all working out of a dorm room.
Their hard work made this company known as “META,” one of the most popular social networking platforms.
But Mark dropped out of Harvard during his sophomore year and moved to Silicon Valley to work on Facebook full-time.
The rest, as they say, is history because this platform is one of the most valuable globally, with over $500 billion in market value.
It has a monthly active audience of over 2.91 billion, and 19% of this audience is men aged between 25 and 34.
Facebook current shareholders
The data from capital.com and investopedia.com show that Meta’s key shareholders are the following:
- The company’s co-founder Mark Zuckerberg is the largest shareholder, with 16.8% of all outstanding shares.
- In the second position comes the Vanguard Group, an asset management firm globally with a 7.9% stake.
- Fidelity Management, one of the widespread financial services companies in the US, holds a 4.9% stake.
- BlackRock specializes in the stock market, including ETFs, and mutual funds hold a 4.4% stake.
- State Street Global specializes in financial services and has a 4.1% stake.
- Rowe Price Associates, which is another US US-based investment management firm, has a 3.3% stake.
These are the major shareholders in the Meta company, formally known as Facebook, but there are also other companies and individuals.
Meta has a cuuret market value of $240.73 billion, but the figure can fluctuate depending n the stock market conditions.
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How does Meta (Facebook) make money?
This social network’s primary source of income is selling advertising space to businesses operating online.
These advertisers typically use their websites and mobile applications to promote their offerings and pay accordingly.
Meta owns Instagram, messaging apps Messenger and WhatsApp social networks that allow users to share photos and videos.
And many individuals and businesses leverage their audience to promote their products profitably.
In addition, Meta has an ecosystem users can use to connect through its Oculus virtual reality products.
We can name its main competitors in the online advertising industry as Amazon, Google, Pinterest, Linkedin, YouTube, and the like.
Is Facebook a good advertising platform?
You can use many online advertising platforms to promote your business, and Facebook or Meta is one of the best options.
However, you must know how to leverage online advertising platforms profitably to avoid losing money.
Meta ( Facebook) has a vast user base of over 2.9 billion active users every month, enabling you to reach your target audience.
It also offers the option to target your preferred audience based on criteria such as age, location, interests, and the like.
Given that this platform shares too many ads daily be cautious to avoid yours being missed in the News Feed ro lost in the shuffle.
It can also be challenging to keep on which Facebook ads work and which don’t because this platform changes its algorithm constantly.
But it is with it if you want to reach millions of potential customers and make yiur business profitable.
Can you post ads on Facebook for free?
Does Facebook own Instagram?
Mark Zuckerberg bought Instagram in 2012 for $1 billion for the photo-sharing app, which many people considered a considerable investment.
At the time, Instagram was not generating much revenue, but this Facebook’s CEO has proved to be a savvy investor because this platform is now worth over $100 billion.
In addition, Zuckerberg bought WhatsApp for $19 billion in 2014, but this platform is less successful than Facebook and Instagram.
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What is the future of Facebook?
Facebook (META) has been facing some challenges lately due to being embroiled in scandals, and its user growth has slowed.
But despite all of this, it remains one of the world’s most popular social network platforms, and it will likely continue to grow in popularity.
Some social network,g experts, predict that Meta will become even more popular and profitable than it is today.
They base their opinions on that Meta’s owners continue innovating and introducing new features to keep users engaged.
Meta will likely remain a dominant force in the social media landscape for years to come.
Final thoughts
That’s all we can say about how Mark Zuckerberg managed to own 25% of Facebook, and we hope you will like this article.
The truth is that Meta’s CEO currently owns 16.8% of Meta’s outstanding shares, but he is still the main shareholder.
Mark is an outstanding investor and manager who has made Facebook one of the global social media platforms.
This technological genius achieved this level of success while still young, and there is no doubt he has many years to reach more success.
Besides tech skills, Mark has strong business acumen, and peole who work with him say he makes intelligent decisions to grow his businesses.