Billionaire Dan Loeb’s Biggest Moves in Q4

Moving on to another bullish move made by billionaire Loeb, the New York-hedge fund manager upped his position in Allergan plc (NYSE:AGN) by 1.73 million shares during the October-to-December quarter, to 5.40 million shares. The stake was valued at approximately $1.69 billion at the end of December and accounted for 17.12% of his fund’s entire portfolio. In November 2015, Pfizer Inc. (NYSE:PFE) and Allergan announced a merger agreement under which the two businesses will combine to create the world’s largest drugmaker. The combined company is anticipated to keep Allergan’s Irish legal domicile, which makes the deal the largest corporate inversion in history. The tax-inversion deal is expected to close in the second half of 2016. Although most investors and analysts have been focusing on the financial benefits of this deal, Pfizer’s executives have been suggesting that Allergan plc (NYSE:AGN)’s product pipeline is also greatly underestimated by the market. In the meantime, the shares of the Botox-maker are down by nearly 10% since the beginning of 2016. Jacob Gottlieb’s Visium Asset Management owns 1.10 million shares of Allergan plc (NYSE:AGN) as of December 31.

Third Point LLC was also bullish on Dow Chemical Co (NYSE:DOW) in the final quarter of 2015, as the fund lifted its stake in the company by 1.75 million shares during the three-month period. Dan Loeb’s firm owned 25.25 million shares of Dow Chemical at the end of 2015, which were worth approximately $1.30 billion. In December 2015, Dow Chemical Co (NYSE:DOW) and E I Du Pont De Nemours And Co (NYSE:DD) announced an all-stock merger that will definitely reshape the chemical and agricultural industries. The transaction is anticipated to close in the second half of this year, with the combined company to be called DowDuPont. The soon-to-be created behemoth will strive to generate $3 billion in cost synergies before splitting into three independent, publicly-traded companies, which will include a pure-play agriculture company, a pure-play material science company, and an innovation-driven specialty products company. Under the terms of the deal, each shareholder of Dow Chemical will receive one share of the combined company for each Dow share owned, while DuPont Shareholders will receive 1.282 shares for each DuPont share. John A. Levin’s Levin Capital Strategies increased its position in Dow Chemical Co (NYSE:DOW) by 1.40 million shares during the fourth quarter, to 5.31 million shares.