4/7/2026
Ackman’s Pershing Square Offers to Buy Universal Music Group for More Than $63 Billion
Wall Street Journal (04/07/26) Look, Aimee; Vipers, Gareth
Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square Capital said it had made an offer to buy Universal Music Group (AMS: UMG), valuing the record label at more than US$63.48 billion. The deal for the label behind Bad Bunny, Taylor Swift and the Beatles, if approved, would close by the end of the year and would involve Universal merging with Pershing Square Sparc Holdings, a specially-created acquisition vehicle. The new entity would be based in Nevada and would shift its stock listing from Amsterdam to the New York Stock Exchange, Pershing said. “UMG’s stock price has languished due to a combination of issues that are unrelated to the performance of its music business and importantly, all of them can be addressed with this transaction,” Pershing’s Chief Executive Bill Ackman said Tuesday. One of the “big three” record labels alongside Warner Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment, it commands a market share of more than 30% of the global recorded-music business. Universal’s other major shareholders include French billionaire Vincent Bolloré, Vivendi SE and China’s Tencent. Together, they control substantial voting rights in the company. Any deal will require a two-thirds vote to pass, according to Pershing Square’s proposal. Split between cash and stock, Ackman’s proposal rests on several assumptions about the future company. At €30.40 a share, equivalent to $35.15, the current stock outstanding would be worth more than $63 billion. Valuing the deal, however, is complicated, according to investors. Pershing Square said the deal would enable the new company to extinguish 17% of its shares, leaving an equity value of around $58 billion after the payment of the cash component. That figure assumes the value of the new company’s shares will be worth substantially more than those of the existing one. Pershing Square said this is possible because under the plan, the new company would take on €5.4 billion in debt and sell its stake in Spotify for €1.5 billion. It is also basing the future share price on its forecast for future earnings. Another measure of the deal’s value: Current shareholders can request to receive all shares or all cash. If enough shareholders take only stock, those receiving all cash would receive €22 per share. Universal’s shares traded up around 13% on Tuesday at €19.40 per share, or around €35 billion in market capitalization, below Pershing Square’s proposed valuation. The current share price is only slightly higher than the €18.50 reference price during the company’s 2021 initial public offering. As part of the proposal, Pershing Square said the new company would appoint a fresh board of directors, which would include former Disney chief Michael Ovitz. Ackman’s interest in Universal dates back to 2021 when he tried to use another investment vehicle, Pershing Square Tontine, to invest in the label. The Tontine SPAC announced plans to buy a 10% stake in Universal from French media conglomerate Vivendi, but Ackman quickly dropped the move after failing to convince regulators that the deal met the rules for such vehicles and some shareholders balked. After the SPAC effort collapsed, Ackman restructured the deal, using his Pershing Square hedge fund to directly acquire the 10% stake in Universal. A year later, Ackman joined the company’s board and Universal became one of Pershing’s largest positions. In 2025, Ackman stepped down from the board, citing other commitments. The Pershing founder is well-known for his aggressive tactics, but the journey from passive investor to company insider and then potential owner is an unusual one. Ackman’s SPARC investment vehicle was cleared by the SEC in 2023 and was designed to act as an elevated version of a traditional special-purpose acquisition company. While a SPAC raises money from investors before finding a company to merge with and take public, Pershing’s SPARC Holdings flips the order. The “r” stands for “rights,” signaling investors’ rights to buy in after a target is identified. Universal has its operational headquarters in Santa Monica and its corporate headquarters in Hilversum, Netherlands. The label started trading on the Euronext Amsterdam in September 2021 after a spinoff from Vivendi, the conglomerate steered by the Bolloré family.
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