Billionaire Paul Singer Launches Latest Activist Campaign, While Eminence Capital Buys More Shares of a Favorite Stock

Another Schedule 13D filing disclosed that Ricky Sandler’s Eminence Capital L.P. owns 13.08 million shares of Autodesk Inc. (NASDAQ:ADSK), 683,541 shares of which represent call options. The freshly-disclosed stake accounts for 5.8% of the company’s outstanding common stock. This compares to the ownership stake of 6.64 million shares held by Eminence on September 30. The public filing also reveals that Eminence Capital teamed up with Scott Ferguson’s Sachem Head Capital Management, and that they intend “to coordinate certain efforts with respect to their investment” in the design software and services company. Earlier this month, Sachem filed a 13D reporting an ownership stake of 12.89 million Autodesk shares (read more details).

The leader in 3D design, engineering and entertainment software has seen its shares advance by slightly over 1% since the beginning of the year, thanks to their strong performance during the fourth quarter. The company has been transitioning towards cloud-based services, and recently announced its plans to accelerate its efforts in this sphere so as to take advantage of the platform shift from the desktop to the cloud. However, the company’s margins may suffer in the upcoming quarters due to increased investments in cloud-based infrastructure and marketing efforts.

The number of hedge funds within our database with positions in Autodesk dropped to 45 from 48 during the second quarter, with them stockpiling 19.70% of the company’s shares. Similarly, the value of the money held in the stock by those investors declined to $2.25 billion from $2.52 billion quarter-over-quarter. John Griffin’s Blue Ridge Capital added a 6.92 million-share position in Autodesk Inc. (NASDAQ:ADSK) to its portfolio during the September quarter.

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