Governments are flexing their muscles over bad corporate behaviour, starting with social media firms

What made social media companies so successful also makes them easy targets for government muscle-flexing, says Merryn Somerset Webb.

180723-zuckerberg

Mark Zuckerberg's grilling proves Facebook is not above the law
(Image credit: 2018 The Washington Post)

Over the last few years we have pointed out over and over again that when governments feel like being in control, they can take control. This is something the global corporations that have spent the last 20-30 years behaving as if the world is mostly their oyster (low taxes, minimum regulation, cheap labour, minimal shareholder oversight) are finally beginning to grasp as are governments.

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Merryn Somerset Webb

Merryn Somerset Webb started her career in Tokyo at public broadcaster NHK before becoming a Japanese equity broker at what was then Warburgs. She went on to work at SBC and UBS without moving from her desk in Kamiyacho (it was the age of mergers).

After five years in Japan she returned to work in the UK at Paribas. This soon became BNP Paribas. Again, no desk move was required. On leaving the City, Merryn helped The Week magazine with its City pages before becoming the launch editor of MoneyWeek in 2000 and taking on columns first in the Sunday Times and then in 2009 in the Financial Times

Twenty years on, MoneyWeek is the best-selling financial magazine in the UK. Merryn was its Editor in Chief until 2022. She is now a senior columnist at Bloomberg and host of the Merryn Talks Money podcast -  but still writes for Moneyweek monthly. 

Merryn is also is a non executive director of two investment trusts – BlackRock Throgmorton, and the Murray Income Investment Trust.