Your second sentence makes no sense. If the board and shareholders sell the company, "they" aren't owned by anyone. The board is no longer the board and the sha

Your second sentence makes no sense. If the board and shareholders sell the company, "they" aren't owned by anyone. The board is no longer the board and the shareholders are no longer the shareholders. They're just a bunch of regular people holding big bags of money. It's like if you sell your car to a dangerous driver: you have no financial stake in whether they go on to crash it.