Dutch King has no shares in Royal companies

King Willem-Alexander has no shares in companies that have the 'Royal' predicate, according to a message that appeared on the Koninklijk Huis website on Thursday. This implies that the King does not own shares in Shell, which has seen lots of negative publicity in the Netherlands and abroad over the past years, ANP reports.

"The predicated does not mean that the company involved is a supplier or has a different relationship with the Royal Family", the message reads. It does not state whether any other members of the Royal Family have or had shares in Royal companies.

The fact that the Dutch King does not own shares in Royal companies is not a new development, government information service Rijksvoorlichtingsdienst explained, according to the news wire. The message was now placed on the Koninklijk Huis website "to avoid ambiguity in connection with questions that have arisen about it".

During a recent UN visit to Nigeria, Queen Maxima was called "the largest shareholder of Shell" in local media. It has often been said and written that King Willem-Alexander, and before him Queens Wilhelmina, Juliana and Beatrix, are large shareholders of Shell. The Oranjes fell out of the picture at Shell when it was legally stipulated that shareholders who owned more than 5 percent of a company's shares had to give them up, but that did not put an end to the stories, according to ANP.

In the Netherlands a company needs to exist for at least 100 years before it can apply for the 'Royal' predicate. Companies that currently have that predicate include Ahold, DSM, Gazelle, Grolsch, KLM, KPN, Philips, Schiphol, and Shell.