Originally Posted by
sqwkvfr
But shareholders aren't vested in the industry, are they? They can move their funds from one sector of the economy to another with a few clicks of a mouse.
Just because the opportunity for them to make money in the craps game that is the stock market doesn't, for a second, mean that the industry in which they are betting is being improved by the management of the company in which they are investing.
A perfect example is JetBlue's recent cave to a few industry speculators by adding seats (losing seat pitch --for which Jetblue was always appreciated--) and charging for bags. It bothers me greatly that a few people armed with financial blogs can advocate for a major shift from the customer and to the shareholder and actually win.
But, hey; JetBlue's stock jumped 4% that day, so it must be right, correct??
That's what you get when you are a publicly traded company. By law your duty is to the shareholder. If you want to stay a privately held company, then you can pretty much run it the way you see fit, you can be customer focused.