Billionaire investor Bill Ackman aims to take his investment firm Pershing Square public, according to an exclusive Wall Street Journal report. The report states that Ackman plans to sell a 10% stake in Pershing Square in a funding round and plans to raise $1.05 billion, implying a valuation of $10.5 billion for the investment firm.
With this funding round, Ackman is considering an eventual initial public offering in the U.S., but according to the report, he hasn’t hired bankers or officially started that process.
As of April, Pershing Square had $18.6 billion of assets under management (AUM), mostly through its closed-end fund Pershing Square Holdings, which trades on European stock exchanges. Ackman is a prominent hedge fund investor known for market-topping returns and activist campaigns and plans to offer a new investment vehicle on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). This publicly-traded closed-end fund will invest in 12 to 24 large-cap, investment-grade, “durable growth” companies in North America.
Is IPO ETF a Good Investment?
Turning to Wall Street, analysts have a Moderate Buy consensus rating on Renaissance IPO ETF (NYSEARCA:IPO) shares based on 45 Buys and nine Holds assigned in the past three months, as indicated by the graphic below. After a more than 30% rally in its share price over the past year, the average IPO price target of $46.47 per share implies a 17.1% upside potential.
