Who Owns Facebook?

By: Josh Dunlop Topics: Get Inspired More posts about: Famous Entrepreneurs, Investing

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? - The 10 Richest Facebook Shareholders (1)

Some Facebook Stats

At the time of the IPO, Facebook had approximately an 845million users worldwide. (the current figure stands at 2.4 Billion)
Rounding up 845 million to a billion users, we could say that every user was worth $100 to Facebook at the time of the IPO.
Facebook’s net worth as of February 8th, 2022, is $659.527B. You can track net worth here. As a comparison, the market cap of Alphabet (owners of Google) is in the region of $1.124 Trillion as of February April, 2024. (February 2022 – Mark Zuckerberg’s Net Worth Drops By $31 Billion)
According to Axios, Facebook will generate about $226 per user in the U.S. in 2021.
Worldwide, 26.3% of the online population uses Facebook. (72.4% in the USA – June 2017)
48,268 full-time employees as of March 31, 2020
Update 2021: Facebook Company is now META

#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, 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 April 2024 $155B

[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 Facebookmoney, you could buy…

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

How much of Facebook does Mark Zuckerberg own in 2024?

Mark Zuckerberg owns 13.5% of Facebook in 2024. In 2012 he owned nearly 30% when Facebook went public.

(May 2024 – Mark Zuckerberg’s net worth increases to $155 billion.)

#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 Facebookmoney, 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

Who Owns Facebook? - The 10 Richest Facebook Shareholders (4)

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.

#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 Facebookmoney, 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 basem*nt.

#5 Eduardo Saverin – 5% – $5 Billion

Who Owns Facebook? - The 10 Richest Facebook Shareholders (6)

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.

How much did Eduardo Saverin get from the Facebook settlement?

Eduardo Saverin received a settlement of around 5% of Facebook’s shares, which was estimated to be worth over $5 billion at the time. Currently, he reportedly owns less than 1% of Facebook’s shares, and as of 2024, his net worth is estimated to be over $26 billion.

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.

How much did Sean Parker make from Facebook? His net worth now sits at $2.8 billion.

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

#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 Facebookmoney, 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 Facebookmoney, 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 bitridiculousto 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 Facebookmoney, you could buy…

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

How much is Facebook worth as a company?

As of now, Facebook, now known as Meta Platforms, is valued at around $1.125 trillion. One of the primary reasons for this high valuation is the massive user base of its platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Messenger. These platforms have billions of active users, making them incredibly valuable for targeted advertising and data collection.

Additionally, Meta’s investments in virtual reality and augmented reality technologies have positioned the company for future growth and innovation, contributing to its high valuation. The company’s strong financial performance and consistent revenue growth also play a significant role in its valuation. Overall, the combination of a large and engaged user base, innovative technologies, and robust financials has contributed to Meta’s status as one of the most valuable companies in the world.

Who founded Facebook and how was it made

Facebook was founded by Mark Zuckerberg, along with his college roommates Andrew McCollum, Eduardo Saverin, Chris Hughes, and Dustin Moskovitz. The idea for Facebook was born in Zuckerberg’s Harvard University dorm room in 2004. Zuckerberg’s motivation behind creating Facebook was to connect and socialize with other students at Harvard.

The platform quickly expanded to other Ivy League universities and eventually to colleges and universities worldwide, evolving into the global social media giant we know today. Facebook’s success revolutionized the way people communicate and connect online.

Facebook was initially created using PHP for the backend (the part of a website the user doesn’t see or interact with directly) and JavaScript for the front end. The coding process was challenging, but the team’s dedication and expertise allowed them to overcome the difficulties and create a groundbreaking social media platform.

Everyone is always asking who owns Facebook. The question that should be asked now is, who owns Meta? That’s because, in October 2021, Facebook officially changed its name to Meta Platforms, Inc. The rebranding was part of the company’s strategic shift towards the metaverse, a collective virtual shared space created by the convergence of virtually enhanced physical reality and physically persistent virtual reality.

The name change reflects the company’s broader ambitions beyond social media and its focus on building the next generation of internet-based technologies. Meta owns and operates several prominent platforms and businesses, including Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Oculus VR.

As for who owns Meta, the five largest shareholders include individual insiders like Mark Zuckerberg (who owns the largest share at 13.5%) and Sheryl Sandberg, as well as institutional investors such as Vanguard Group (which seems to own a share in every big tech company), BlackRock, and FMR LLC. These shareholders hold significant influence over the direction and decisions of the company.

FAQ about Facebook and Meta ownership