FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Activist investment fund Inclusive Capital Partners, run by hedge fund veteran Jeffrey Ubben, said on Monday it had acquired a 0.83% stake in Bayer, because the German drugs and agriculture group continues to suffer from a weak market value.
Inclusive Capital said in a press release it had acquired 8.18 million Bayer shares as of Jan. 5, which works out at about 407 million euros ($435 million) based on that day’s closing price.
The Financial Times, which earlier reported Ubben’s investment, said the stake was price $500 million.
Bayer shares gained almost 4% on the news to their highest level in a couple of month. A spokesperson said the corporate doesn’t comment on shareholders or what number of shares they hold as a matter of principle.
The corporate’s shares proceed to be burdened by the specter of further litigation over alleged carcinogenic effects of its weedkiller Roundup, despite regulatory clearance that the product is protected to make use of.
Bayer’ stock market value is about $50 billion for all its businesses including pharmaceuticals, consumer health products, seeds and pesticides, well below the $63 billion deal value for its 2018 takeover of Roundup-maker Monsanto.
Chief Executive Werner Baumann, who engineered the troubled Monsanto deal, in 2020 was given a recent contract until 2024 and said on the time he would depart the corporate when that term expires.
(Reporting by Ludwig Burger; Editing by Susan Fenton)
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