Poll of the Day > Can a company just shut down whenever they like?

(+) Yeah! (+)

Obviously it would never happen because money but could Google or Apple decide to just simply close? Not cause of financial trouble but just because

If for whatever reason the board decided to just close the company and shut it down permanently, could they?

Depends on their contractual responsibilities to others.

If they aren't under contract with another party at the time and it's a "just cause" I don't see why not. However depending on their role/services/products, they could get sued if quickly shutting down without warning I am sure.

There's usually procedures and oversight required due to companies needing to register their tax status with the government as an LLC and so forth.

Technically yes. There's been reports of companies shutting down so fast their employees had no clue it was even happening.

In reality, not really. There's a bunch of contracts and the like which would have to be settled and resolved, a multitude of financial things that would need to be paid, and so-forth. While a small company could probably lock it's doors and just settle all the stuff after once you move beyond one primary office space there's just a lot of legal stuff.

Like, if Apple decided to shut down tomorrow, even if they locked the home office, there's a bunch of apple stores out there in places like malls and such, places that produce their products, and other things which would need to be dealt with. So they couldn't JUST lock down and be done with it.

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BlackScythe0 posted...

Depends on their contractual responsibilities to others.

These. Even if there aren't specific laws dictating how they have to shut down, large companies can't exist without intertwining themselves with other entities, and those connections have to be tied up before the company can disappear.

I'm not sure how that would work with a publicly traded company.

rjsilverthorn posted...

I'm not sure how that would work with a publicly traded company.

They would have to buy back all their stock as one of the steps, but I'm not sure what all would be involved beyond that.

BlackScythe0 posted...

They would have to buy back all their stock as one of the steps, but I'm not sure what all would be involved beyond that.

I'm not sure they technically would. If they voted on shutting down and had a majority stake, that might be enough. While there's a supposed responsibility to shareholders, that's rarely worked in practice because the majority shareholders have often worked to the detriment of the lesser holders.