Mario Gabelli

The Breaking News column by Cox, Cyran, Wade & Ford, reports that the author of the "Magna Carta of Shareholders Rights", Mario Gabelli, who railed against supervoting shares has established a company, Gamco Investors, with, you guessed it, supervoting shares.  The company went public in 1999 with two classes on common shares.  Gabelli controls the company's Class B stock, each with 10 votes.  The Class A shareholders hold 25 percent of the equity and have only 3 percent of the vote.  The effect?  Gabelli could pay himself $55 million last year when assets under management fell 7 percent, stock price slide 10 percent, and profits were flat.