Barack Obama, John McCain, and The Future of Facebook
Will Facebook be sold within the next year? A question I’ve heard asked countless times over the last, well, few years. So here’s some insight — that could very much depend on who wins the presidential election in November.
Currently, the federal tax rate for a capital gain (making a profit from an asset you’ve held for over a year) is 15%. Many suspect that with a Democratic congress and president, that rate might rise to 28%. If that’s the case, Mark Zuckerberg would save himself a lot of money if he decided to sell the company before a change in the tax laws.
So let’s do the math. At a $15 billion dollar valuation (which Microsoft set at its last invesment), with Mark owning 30%, his share is worth $4.5 billion.
At a 15% captial gains tax rate, he would pay $675,000,000 in taxes to the federal government. At a 28% capital gains tax, he would pay $1,260,000,000 (not to mention state and local taxes).
This means that if the Democrats win in November and raise the capital gains rate, Mark would pay over a half a billion dollars in additional taxes upon the sale of Facebook— $585,000,000 to be exact.
I’d imagine the investors who own the other 70% or so would be pressuring him to sell as well. That all said, Mark’s history of turning down a lot of big offers in the past shows that perhaps he’s not in it for the money and saving a half billion dollars isn’t worth losing control of his baby.
Note: I’m terrible at math so correct me if any of these numbers are wrong.
Note 2: Reader Peter e-mailed me to point out that if Facebook was sold as a non-cash transaction (stock), that would reduce the tax burden.
