How do they manage to control the narrative ?
- CaroleB
- Aug 8, 2024
- 15 min read
Updated: Jul 23
This article will concentrate on the US but feel free to do the same exercice with other countries.
The same tactics are used worldwide though and it is made through:
the economics and financial control
the media control
the control in politics and institutions
The power of the mega corporations
The video above is a few years old but I'll use it and update the data.
The information given below are not conspiracy theories. They are facts that you can easily check yourself online. These facts have been updated last on 07/08/2024.
The main message that needs to go through is:
A handful of mega corporations control our world
And I'll give a few examples below.
The food sector
These mega corporations dominate every aspect of our lives. It may seem like an exaggeration but from the breakfast that's on our table in the morning to the mattress we sleep on at night and everything we do use or consume in between are largely dependent on these corporations.
These are investment companies and they manage the major money flows on Earth.
How does it work in the food sector?
Above is the chart showing the most important food brands around the world and who owns them.
Eleven corporations have currently the monopoly.
Let's take an example with Pepsico which is the parent company of some of the most popular soft drinks and snacks in the world: Tropicana, Quaker, Pepsi, Lays, Cheetos etc.
All these companies appear to be many different competing brands but in reality they all come from the same factories of a small number of corporations that together have a monopoly on the industry.
Within the packaged food industry, there are a small number of other major companies such as Unilever, The Coca-Cola Company, Mondelez and Nestle.
On the image above, you see that virtually every well-known brand in this industry belongs to one of these corporations. You can easily verify this information yourself by checking online.
Companies of this size are usually publicly traded and have a board. It is easy to find out on Google who the largest shareholeders of these companies are.
Let's take Pepsico again as an example.
As of 07/08/2024, we see that 76.83% of the shares are held by no less than 4149 institutional investors. These include investment companies, mutual funds, insurance companies, banks and in some cases governments.
Looking at who the largest institutional investors of Pepsico are, you can see just 10 out of the 4149 investors account for almost 1/3 of all shares. The combined share capital of these top 10 has a value of approximately 75 billion dollars but of those 10 investors three owned more shares than the remaining seven: Vanguard Group Inc, Blackrock Inc and State Street Corp
Let's remember their names and let's have a look at the Coca-Cola Company now:
We can see that just like with Pepsico, the majority of the shares are held by institutional investors. The 4 most important ones are: Berkshire Hathaway Inc, Vanguard Group Inc, Blackrock Inc, State Street Corporation.
These are the four largest investment companies on the planet.
Looking at this, it is easy to find out that in reality, Pepsico and Coca-Cola are anything but competitors.
Make your own searches and you'll see that most other companies mentionned above such as Unilever and Mondelez are also owned by the same small group of institutional investors.
Other important names in the sector are Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs Group Inc etc.
I am inviting you to check by yourself - the same names always reappear everywhere.
The technology industry
Let's look now at the largest companies within the technology industry:
Alphabet is the parent company of all Google businesses including YouTube and Gmail but they are also the biggest sponsors and developers of Android - one of the two operating systems on which almost all smartphones and tablets in the world run.
The other operating system is Apple's IOS.
Finally if we add Microsoft and Samsung, we see that four companies produce the software that almost all computers, tablets and smartphones in the world depend on.
Let's see who owns the most shares of these powerful companies:
Apple
Alphabet
I'm inviting you to carry on the exercise on your own.
When we look at all the companies that dominate the technology industry and build our computers, TVs, smartphones and household appliances, we see that this is always the same big investors who own a majority of the shares.
Let's carry on looking at all industries around the world.
The travel industry
On your computer or smartphone, you'll likely to be looking for a cheap flight to the sun through websites like Skyscanner and Expedia.
Skyscanner
It is owned by Trip.com. The usual same shareholders appear:
Expedia
As you can see, both belong to the same group of institutional investors.
Let's look at Airlines and aircrafts now. Most are often owned by the same investors or even by governments.
Boeing
Air France-KLM and Airbus are mostly owned by the French government:
Accommodations are usually booked through booking.com or airbnb.com. Let's look at them:
Booking Holdings
Airbnb
Once you arrive at your destination, you can leave some reviews on TripAdvisor:
The same investors are at the basis of every aspect of our journey and their power goes even much further because even the kerosene that fuels the plane comes from one of their many oil companies and refineries. Just like the steel that the plane is made of comes from one of their many mining companies.
The primary industries
This small club of investment companies, banks and mutual funds are also the largest shareholders in the primary industries where raw materials come from.
Vedanta is now private. Let's look at the next two.
Kinross Gold
Pan American Silver Corp
The same goes for the largest agricultural companies in the world that our entire food industry depends on.
Oil refineries
Shell
Exxon Mobile
Tobacco
Philip Morris
Textiles and clothing
TJX
They are the leading off-price retailer of fashion apparel and home fashions, operating under various brands such as T.J.Maxx, Marshalls, HomeGoods, and Sierra.
Nike
Levi Strauss
Pharmaceutical companies
Moderna
Pfizer
Electronic companies
Dell
Online marketplaces
Ebay
Amazon
Payment methods:
Mastercard
Visa
This is just the tip of the iceberg. If you decide to investigate on your own using the same ressources, you will discover that even many of the most well-known insurance companies, banks, construction companies, telephone companies, restaurant chains and cosmetic brands are owned by the same institutional investors.
They all form an immense network that we can compare to a pyramid: the smaller institutional investors are owned by larger investors who in turn belong to even larger investors.
The visible top of this pyramid consists of only two companies and we have seen their names many times by now: Vanguard and Blackrock.
Vanguard and Blackrock have a power that we can barely imagine - not only are they the largest institutional investors of nearly every major company on Earth but they also own the other institutional investors of those companies giving them a complete monopoly.
According to a report by Bloomberg, one of the most respected institutions in the world in the field of financial data and analytics, experts expect that by 2028 both companies will collectively manage about 20 trillion dollars in investments and in the process will own almost everything on Earth.
Bloomberg called Blackrock the "4th branch of government" because it is the only non-government entity that has a close relationship with the federal banks - also called the central banks.
Blackrock not only lends money to the federal banks but is also their principal advisor and the developer of the computer system that the federal banks use. Dozens of Blackrock employees had senior positions in the White House during the Bush and the Obama administrations and currently under Joe Biden.
Blackrock CEO Larry Fink is a welcome guest with many heads of state and politicians and understandably so, he's the face of the company that pulls the strings. Yet, Larry Fink does not pull the strings himself. In fact, Blackrock itself is also owned by shareholders - Vanguard being one of them:
This is where it gets dark: Vanguard itself has a unique structure that makes it impossible to see who its shareholders or clients are:
It is then impossible to know who owns Vanguard, the most powerful company on Earth.
Reports by Oxfam and Bloomberg show that 1% percent of the world's population collectively owns more money than the other 99%. Indeed, Oxfam claims that as much as 82% of all the money earned in 2017 went to this 1% of people.
Naturally those who own the most powerful company on Earth would also be the richest among this 1%.
Forbes, the most well-known business magazine in the world claims that by March 2020, there were some 2075 billionaires. Oxfam's report showed that 2/3 of all these billionaires obtained their fortune through inheritances and monopolies. So this means that Vanguard is in the hands of the richest families on Earth.
If we study their history, we discover that these families have always belonged to the top of the pyramid. Some even well before the industrial revolution began.
More information is to come soon about what we call "the rober barrons". Their history is so interesting and extensive that it needs a separate article. Let's just point out for now that many of these families belong to royal bloodlines and they are the founders of our banking system, the United Nations and every industry in the world.
These families never lost their power but because of an increasing world population they were forced to hide behind investment companies such as Vanguard.
The power of media concentration
The next topic should start with a natural question such as: if two companies have a total monopoly over all the industries in the world, why didn't we hear about all of this in the media?
“Whoever controls the media, controls the mind.” (1969).
The quote above - attributed to Jim Morrison, lead singer of ‘60s rock band The Doors - is still very much up-to-date.
Media concentration has indeed reached recently phenomenal levels.
Conn Hallinan, a columnist with Foreign Policy in Focus, a project of the Washington, D.C. –based Institute for Policy Studies, has said that when Ben Bagdikian American journalist - published his book "The New Media Monopoly" in 2004, there were 100 corporations controlling media outlets in the U.S.
It is said that today, six corporations are controlling 90% of media outlets in the U.S.:
National Amusements is now owned by Paramount Global, TimeWarner by AT&T and News Corp has merged with Fox.
News Corp
News Corp owns most newspapers and magazines in the world. This includes The Times, The Sun, The Wall Street Journal etc :
The shares of News Corp are owned by the American multi-billionaire Rupert Murdoch and by the institutional investors we see everywhere else. News Corp's sister company is Fox
Corporation which is also one of the most powerful media conglomerates on Earth.
Here again we find the same shareholders.
Comcast
This is the parent company of NBC, DreamWorks, Universal, The Sky Group and many other major media brands.
Walt Disney
The Walt Disney Company is a conglomerate of unimaginable dimensions with many subsidiaries such as Pixar, Marvel, 20th century, LucasFilm, ABC, National Geographic and Hulu.
AT&T
They own Warner Bros, HBO, Discovery Channel, CNN, Cartoon Network etc
Paramount global
This is the parent company of among others all CBS channels, Paramount where the most famous movies and series in the world come from, MTV, Comedy Central, Nickelodeon, the popular British Channel 5 and a popular australian Network 10.
Guess who the largest shareholders are?
Streaming monopolies:
Netflix
Amazon
Media concentration worldwide:
In the UK, most popular newspapers and magazines are owned by the Daily Mail Group (now part as News Corp) and Reach.
More information on media concentration in the UK:
In the Netherlands, the entire media is in the hands DPG Media, Mediahuis and Bertelsmann.
In Germany the entire media is either controlled by the German government, ProSiebenSat.1, Axel Springerand etc. And again Bertelsmann which is a conglomerate of unprecedented dimensions not only is this the parent company of the largest book publisher in the world (Penguin Random House) and owner and founder of BMG music.
Bertelsmann also controls a large part of the European media through their subsidiary RTL, a company with 67 TV channels, 10 streaming platforms and 38 radio stations.
Bertelsmann is owned by the ultra rich Bertelsmann-Mohn family.
Besides RTL, they also own a large part of the French mainstream media and together with Mediaset, the powerful Italian conglomerate of former president Berlusconi, they control the main part of the Italian mainstream media.
Mediaset also owns all popular Spanish TV channels.
News channels:
The various news media do not produce their news themselves but use information and images from news agencies such as Reuters, the Dutch ANP and the French AFP.
These organizations are anything but independent. Reuters is owned by the powerful Canadian Thomson family, the ANP is owned by Dutch investor Chris Oomen and the AFP is largely financed by the French government.
The main journalists and editors who work at our media or at these news agencies are affiliated with important journalistic organizations such as the European Journalism Center. These are one of the largest founders of media related projects across europe. They train journalists, produce study materials, give internships and work closely with the world's largest corporations such as Google and Facebook.
For journalistic analysis and opinion, all the major media outlets in the world use Project Syndicate - the most powerful organization within its field. It supplies the 506 most important media outlets in 156 countries.
Project Syndicate plus an organization such as the European Journalism Center, together with the news agencies are the connecting link between all the different media outlets around the world.
When newscasters read the news from their teleprompters, there is a good chance that the text comes from one of these organizations. As a result the global media is often synchronized in its reporting.
The power of non-profit organisations
They are the links that connect the business community with politics and the media allowing major conflicts of interest. At first glance however this is not too noticeable.
Foundations, their power and links with the media
Non-profits also called foundations are organizations that rely on donations and they do not have to publish from whom they receive those donations. They can invest this money in whatever they want and do not have to pay tax on their profits as long as those profits are reinvested in other projects that they are involved in. Non-profits can move hundreds of
billions of dollars from invisible investors.
According to a report by the Australian government, this makes non-profit organizations ideal to finance terrorist groups and launder large sums of money.
Misuse of the non-profit sector for money laundering and terrorism financing | Australian Institute of Criminology (aic.gov.au)
The foundations and funds of the families who are highest in the hierarchy of the 1% hide behind the scenes as much as possible. However, for cases that have a lot of publicity and attention, they use the foundations of philanthropist families that are lower in the ranking but who are also extremely wealthy.
I will only highlight the three most important foundations on Earth that connect all the industries in the world to each other.
These are the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Open Society Foundations of the
controversial multi-billionaire George Soros and the Clinton Foundation.
A very brief introduction to give you an idea of the size of these types of foundations:
The Gates Foundation is the second largest funder of the World Health Organization (WHO):
Their power is huge. They donate everywhere - below is just a small example:
This makes the Gates Foundation one of the most influential organizations in the world. They have infiltrated everything that relates to our health.
The Gates Foundation has a close partnership with the 16 largest pharmaceutical companies in the world including Pfizer, Astraseneca, Johnson and Johnson, Bayer etc
Bill gates is also he founder of Microsoft which is owned mostly by Blackrock & Vanguard :
We could spend hours if we were to consider everything that the Gates Foundation, the Open Society foundations of George Soros and the Clinton Foundation are involved in. I might come back to it at some point but for now let just see their links with the media conglomerates:
Below are the one of organisations who fund Project Syndicate. Appear the names of Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Open Society Foundation and even the European Journalism Center.
At the European Journalism Center itself again we see the Gates Foundation and the Open Society Foundations but they also receive large donations from Meta, Google, The Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs and even Project Syndicate.
Another funny thing is that both Project Syndicate and the EJC fund each other.
The World Economic Forum
From the elite that controls every aspect of our lives up to the information that we receive depend on an unimaginably coordinated collaboration to keep all the different industries on Earth connected to each other. And in order to ensure they all work in their own interests, they have created the World Economic Forum.
The WEF is one of the most important organizations in the world. At its annual meeting in Davos (SWitzerland), the CEOs of the largest companies on Earth gather along with heads of states, politicians and other influential individuals and organizations such as the Unicef and Greenpeace.
More information on who is attending Davos here:
Serving on the board of trustees is former US vice president and climate change guru Al Gore, Blackrock CEO Larry Fink, the President of the European Central Bank Christine Lagarde, the director of CERN Fabiola Giannotti, the Queen of Jordan etc
The full list can be found here:
According to the WEF's official website, their annual membership fee ranges between 53 000 and 530 000 EUR but according to their last financial year report, they'd only received 430 000 EUR - about 2/3 of their total budget coming from partnerships and memberships.
Young Global Leaders & Global Shapers
The Young Global Leaders forms the leaders of tomorrow. Many current heads of states, multi-million corporate CEOs etc come from it.
For more information on the YGL, please refer to the following article :
The extent of the YGL's political influence:
Here is what Klaus Schwab, the WEF founder has to say about the YGL:
"When I mention names like Mrs Merkel, even Vladimir Putin and so on - they all have been Young Global Leaders of the World Economic Forum but what we are very proud of now, is the young generation like Prime Minister Trudeau, President of Brazil, President of Argentina and so on.
We penetrate the cabinets.
So yesterday I was at the reception for Prime Minister Trudeau and I know that more than half of his cabinet are from the YGL."
The Global Shapers
This is another institution created by the World Economic Forum in 2012. It is aimed at the under 30 who in their opinion have enough potential to be a tomorrow's leader.
About 10,000 participants around the world have been through this programme and they have set up about WEF 450 hubs.
Below is a video showing the influence of the Global Shapers in Canada:
Here are the Names and Faces of WEF’s Young Global Leaders in the United Kingdom – The Expose (expose-news.com)
To sum up: most of the world industries are owned by a handful of mega-corporations. Vanguard being at the top of the pyramid and it is impossible to know who hides behind this mega-corporation. What's more, the media and the organizations that are at the heart of our information flow are funded by the non-profit organizations of the same elite.
This is a lot of information to process and believe me I've made it as short as possible and I've only used those examples that seem necessary enough in order to show you the overall picture. This is meant to change your view on many subjects and it is also to inform you on the danger in which we presently find ourselves.
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