Elliott Turns to Snail Mail in NXP Mom-and-Pop Investor Campaign (Reuters)
(Reuters) – Activist hedge fund Elliott Management Corp launched a campaign on Thursday to convince NXP Semiconductor NV (NXPI.O) mom-and-pop investors to shoot down a $38 billion deal to sell the semiconductor company to larger peer Qualcomm Inc (QCOM.O). The campaign involves posting glossy presentations to tens of thousands of individual NXP shareholders, as opposed to institutional investors such as mutual funds. Such mom-and-pop investors account for an estimated 11.6 percent of NXP’s shareholder base.
David Einhorn’s Greenlight Capital Lost 6% in January (The Wall Street Journal)
David Einhorn’s Greenlight Capital lost roughly 6% in January, extending a multiyear period of weakness for the hedge fund. The losses range from 5.8% to 6.6% depending on the fund, according to a letter sent to investors Wednesday, with Greenlight hurt by the portfolio of stocks it had bet against rising more than two times the S&P 500, Greenlight wrote.
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Steve Cohen Needs to Prove Himself to Wall Street All Over Again (Bloomberg)
There’s a low-slung glass and brick building in Stamford, Conn., steps from Long Island Sound, that once housed one of the most successful hedge funds ever. Inside, the halls are still adorned with works by Jeff Koons and Jasper Johns. The trading room—where phones blink instead of ring—is still kept at 69F to keep traders awake. And Steve Cohen still sits in the middle of it, watching the tape and making his bets. In February the billionaire trader will begin to rebuild his firm, taking in client capital after a two-year ban from managing money for other people. It’s not a banner day for regulators, given that the government spent the better part of a decade going after Cohen. One prosecutor called his former firm, SAC Capital Advisors, a “criminal enterprise” that produced some of its returns by trading on inside information.
Corvex’s Keith Meister Launches Energen Proxy War (TheStreet)
Corvex Management LP‘s Keith Meister on Wednesday escalated his effort to drive a sale of Energen Corp. (EGN – Get Report) by nominating a minority-slate of four dissident director candidates to the company’s nine-person board. “Today we are nominating four highly-qualified, independent director candidates who will bring fresh perspectives and relevant experience along with a simple mandate—to run the company in the best interests of all shareholders,” Meister said in a statement. The escalation comes after Meister, a 10% shareholder, had been urging Energen to hire a bank to explore strategic alternatives such as a sale. He said in October that the case for M&A is “simply too compelling to ignore” and he noted that significant benefits could be unlocked through consolidation.
