Ackman Takes Activist Stance on P&G
By: John Carney | Senior Editor, CNBC.com
Pershing Square Capital Management founder Bill Ackman told the audience at Delivering Alpha that his fund would take an activist role in Proctor & Gamble.
“We’re going to take a hard look to see if we can add any value” to Proctor & Gamble , Ackman said.
Pershing Square, a hedge fund with roughly $10 billion under management, has been a large and active investor in Canadian Pacific Railway and retailer J.C. Penney .
Earlier in the day, Ackman had told investors in a letter that it sold its Citigroup shares to help build a stake in Procter & Gamble. Ackman told CNBC his fund owns about $1.8 billion dollars worth of stock in P&G.
Ackman revealed that his fund owns $1.8 billion worth of stock in the company.
Although the position is large compared to the size of Ackman’s fund, it is not especially large compared to the $177 billion market cap of Proctor & Gamble. Ackman said he believed that Pershing Square could influence the management of the company despite owning just around 1 percent of the stock.
He declined to say whether he would support the current CEO.
"I'd prefer to meet him first," Ackman said.
