Why would all of these CEOs from random companies even be in the same room? In a free market leadership doesn't exist that high, companies aren't supposed to coordinate at that level.
― Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
Note that most public companies have institutional investors as the largest component of their ownership; such investors tend to own all the major competitors.
GM: top 5 are Capital World Investors, Vanguard, BlackRock, Berkshire Hathaway, and Harris Associates.
Ford: top five are Vanguard, BlackRock, Newport, State Street, Franklin.
Fiat-Chrysler: top five are Tiger, Harris, Baillie Gifford, Vanguard, Deutsche Bank, FMR.
Looks like Vanguard is certainly in a position to encourage the big-three car manufacturers to work together.
Intel: Tiger, Harris, Baillie Gifford, Vanguard, Deutsche Bank.
AMD: Vanguard, BlackRock, Wellington, FMR, Invesco.
Your CPU choices will make money for Vanguard.
HPE: Dodge&Cox, Vanguard, BlackRock, Primecap, State Street.
Dell: Temasek Holdings, Dodge&Cox, Elliott, BlackRock, Vanguard.
Apple: Vanguard, BlackRock, Berkshire Hathaway, State Street, FMR.
When you buy computers, you make money for Vanguard.
In summary, Tim Buckley at Vanguard can set up a meeting with any group of CEOs at minimal notice. He doesn't actually own much of anything, but the right of ownership for a large percentage of the USA's economy is a thing that he directs.
Or maybe it's Robert Kapito at BlackRock; same deal.
Umm, no. Unless you have a very different idea of what "large percentage" means.
He does direct investment.
Free market !== unregulated market.
In order for an unregulated market to be a free market, perfect competition is required[0], otherwise you get market failure.
In the real world, we use laws to discourage behavior that leads to market failure.
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_market#Perfect_competitio...