Thus, even if that is expressed in Apple’s stocks that are way less than 5%, the amount required to be reported by law. Referring to the fact that Jobs had denied stock options to one of the early Apple employees from day one. And when Jobs (in the movie, but really a board does this) denied stock to the early garage team (some not even shown) I’m surprised that they chose not to show me giving about $10M of my own stock to them because it was the right thing.

When we fast-forward to 1997, when Apple purchased NeXT because they needed a modern operating system, Jobs returned to Apple as an interim CEO. Over the years, his stake grew to 0.6% of Apple, thanks to his CEO rewards. Berkshire Hathaway owned 916 million shares in Apple and controlled 916 million shareholder votes as of December 2022. A similar situation is also true in the opposite direction because BlackRock is a significant shareholder in many of its publicly traded competitors and other large institutions, making the whole thing even more eyebrow-raising. BlackRock owned 1,029 million shares in Apple and controlled 1,029 million shareholder votes as of December 2022.

Vanguard differs from other large asset managers by having no actual “owner .” Officially Vanguard says that its investors own it since its funds own it, and Vanguard fund investors own those funds. Vanguard (The Vanguard Group) is one of the largest asset managers in the world. It manages other people’s money through its mutual funds and exchange-traded funds and also offers other related investing and financial planning services. Apple has only one class of outstanding shares, with one vote per share. Therefore, there is no difference between the shareholder’s ownership and voting power.

We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. As it is a large company, we’d only expect insiders to own a small percentage of it.

Who owns the most Apple stock?

At his death, the shares went to its trust, now managed by his wife. Part of the stocks in Apple and Disney were liquidated below 5%. When Jobs was ousted from the company in 1985, he sold his Apple shares and moved on to Pixar. In February 2017, Al Gore sold part of its Apple stocks – more precisely, he sold 215,437 stocks at $136.72 as reported to the SEC – which netted him over $29 million. Apple’s mythical founders, Steve Jobs, and Wozniak, at that point already missed as they now owned less than five percent of the company’s stocks. In 2006 Pixar got sold to Disney, and Steve Jobs got around an 8% stake in the company in exchange.

• In this article, I will dive more into who owns Apple and who controls it.
• Vanguard is primarily a mutual fund and ETF management company with about $6.2 trillion in global assets under management (AUM).
• Such financial instruments would track the performance of a benchmark index such as S&P 500 (US500) or Nasdaq 100 (US Tech 100).
• While the Macintosh was more expensive, it offered a more tightly integrated user experience, but the company struggled to make the case to consumers.
• Ownership of Apple Inc. is quite dispersed, and the main shareholders are asset managers investing money that belongs to other investors.
• Notably, sometimes top-level managers are on the board themselves.

Arthur Levinson is an American businessman who serves as Chairman of the Board of Directors for Apple Inc. He has served on their board since 2000, making him one of the longest-serving directors at Apple. His net worth is estimated to be around $1.2 billion, and he owns about 0.029% of Apple stock, according to MarketScreener.

AAPL vs Consumer Electronic Stocks

I will show you who Apple’s largest shareholders are, how many shares and votes they have, and how much their stake is worth. Steve Wozniak expressed multiple times his disinterest in investing and money matters and how they could potentially “corrupt one’s values”. In 2014 while talking about the release of the movie “Jobs” he declared that he had given away $10 million of his own stocks because it was the right thing to do. Fortune magazine articles about Wozniak’s net worth seem to place it around $100 million.

However, when he left the company – after he was ousted – he sold his Apple stocks. In April 1976, they founded Apple Computer Company (now Apple Inc.) in California with an investment of $1,350 in starting capital from them (Jobs had to sell his Volkswagen microbus, while Wozniak sold his Hewlett-Packard calculator). They created an initial partnership agreement that made Jobs and Wozniak equal partners with 50/50 stakes. The third partner, Ronal Wayne, was offered a 10% stake, but he soon backed out due to his concerns that the company wouldn’t be able to succeed, so he sold his 10%. The history of Apple ownership dates back to the 1976 founding of Apple Inc., when Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, and Ronald Wayne decided to start their own business. At the time, Jobs and Wozniak had already become friends through their involvement in the Homebrew Computer Club, and were looking for a way to turn their passion for technology into a business.

Does Steve Jobs still own Apple’s stocks?

Tim Cook has served as CEO of Apple since 2011, when Steve Jobs retired from this position. His role involves leading all aspects of the business, including strategic planning, manufacturing processes, design, and product development. Before becoming CEO, Cook previously worked at IBM for a 12-year period, after which he went on to serve as COO who owns apple now at Intelligent Electronics for six years. From there, he would later join Apple in 1998 as Senior Vice President, under Jobs’ leadership. Since taking up this position at Apple, he has earned various awards, such as numerous Fortune Businessperson rankings throughout the last decade, along with the Financial Times Person of the Year in 2014.

If Steve Jobs kept Apple’s IPO stocks until the end, he’d probably be worth over a hundred billion dollars; since Apple in 2022 passed the $2.5 trillion valuation, Steve Jobs initially had an 11% stake in the company. Apple Inc., formerly Apple Computer, Inc., American manufacturer of personal computers, smartphones, tablet computers, computer peripherals, and computer software and one of the most recognizable brands in the world. It was the first successful personal computer company and the popularizer of the graphical user interface. It’s hard to say for sure but this suggests they have entwined business interests.

All you Need to Know about Business Model Canvas Innovation

Pennsylvania-based investment advisor Vanguard Group owns the biggest proportion of Apple stock among other institutional investors with 7.85% ownership worth $176.44bn, according to WallStreetZen data. Vanguard Group, Blackrock, and Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway are three top shareholders of Apple among institutional investors. However, according to Jones, institutional ownership of a stock may not be so important for retail investors. The institutional investors that own Apple shares include pension funds, hedge funds, mutual funds, money managers and insurance companies.

Like its tech peers, Apple (APPL) hasn’t been immune from the market slump in 2022. But, despite losing over 20% year-to-date (6 June), Apple remains the world’s largest company by market capitalisation and keeps attracting institutional interest. The Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (VOO) is one of the company’s largest exchange traded funds (ETFs) with about $636 billion in net assets. Apple is the number one holding, comprising 6.7% of the VOO portfolio as of Dec. 31, 2020. The top three institutional investors own—in total—slightly more than 20% of the outstanding common stock outstanding for Apple as of Dec. 28, 2020. After he left Apple, Jobs founded NeXT and bought a stake in Pixar from George Lucas.

The largest ones are asset manager Vanguard which owns 8.1% of the company, followed by BlackRock, with a 6.5% ownership share, and Berkshire Hathaway, with a 5.8% ownership share. Tim Cook, CEO of Apple Inc., is currently one of the largest individual shareholders with around 3,279,726 Apple equities/shares worth approximately $426,134,799 at current market prices. Arthur D. Levinson holds around 4,588,724 shares worth around $596,212,909, while former U.S.

However, despite its wide ownership base, ultimately it is up to those at the helm of Apple — Tim Cook, CEO, and Luca Maestri, CFO— to decide how Apple’s products are designed, marketed, and sustained over time. As the market for personal computers expanded and evolved throughout the 1990s, Apple lost considerable market share to the lower-priced duopoly of the Microsoft Windows operating system on Intel-powered PC clones (also known as “Wintel”). In 1997, weeks away from bankruptcy, the company bought NeXT to resolve Apple’s unsuccessful operating system strategy and entice Jobs back to the company. When Jobs resigned in 2011 for health reasons, and died two months later, he was succeeded as CEO by Tim Cook.

Apple’s KPIs

Berkshire Hathaway is the third largest institutional investor of Apple, owning 5.5% of the whole stock worth $123.78bn. As of the first quarter of 2022, Apple was Berkshire’s largest holding, valued at $159.1bn, or over 41% of its $390.53bn stock portfolio. Buffett, known as the ‘Sage of Omaha’ is one of the most successful investors in history. His most recent letter to shareholders revealed that the firm’s compounded annual gain was 20.1% between 1965 and 2021 – almost twice higher than 10.5% achieved by S&P 500.

Founded by legendary investor Warren Buffet, diversified holding company Berkshire Hathaway (BRK) has businesses ranging from insurance to freight rail transportation and energy. In the first quarter of 2022, the firm had $9.66tn of AUM, up from $8.78tn in the same period in 2021. The company went public at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) on 1 October at $14 a share. The firm is famous for pioneering work in creating index-tracking mutual and exchange-traded funds (ETF) easily accessible by retail investors.

BlackRock is not only an asset manager, but it also provides other asset managers and corporations with its Aladdin portfolio management software. As shown in Walt Disney financials, Laurene Powell Jobs Trust still owned 7.8% of the company’s stocks in 2016, corresponding to 128,301,176 shares. As of 2018, that information is missing, which tells us that Jobs’ wife sold part of those stocks.

As such, these major shareholders can exercise their influence over important corporate events, such as executive compensation and capital expenditure decisions. The actions taken by these major stakeholders can also shape investor sentiment and play an integral role in impacting strategic business decisions made by the company. Steve Jobs no longer had any Apple shares after selling off his holdings when he left the company in 1985. He used the money from selling his stocks to purchase Pixar, which was sold to Disney in 2006, granting Steve Jobs an 8% stake in the company.

Sewell is an Apple executive who joined the company from Intel Corporation in 2009. He announced his retirement in 2017 after eight years of leading the company’s legal and security efforts. The contributions made by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak cannot be underestimated when discussing how far Apple has come since its founding days in 1976.