Snapchat said in a regulatory filing that it is in the process of selling $650 million in equity. So far it has raised more than $537 million, underscoring the ease with which some Internet companies can raise money in this environment. Snapchat is the messaging company whose founders earlier turned down a $3 billion acquisition offer from Facebook. We earlier reported that Paul Hudson’s Glade Brook Capital Partners recently launched two new funds designed to make targeted private investments. The Greenwich, Connecticut, firm said Glade Brook Private Opportunities Fund will focus on four to six “big global ideas” over the next 24 months. So far, two Glade Brook investments have been placed into the fund — Uber Technologies, the ride-sharing service, and Snapchat. Glade Brook Private Investors IV, is a separate fund created to invest in just Snapchat.
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William Ackman’s Pershing Square Holdings is up 0.3 percent this month through May 26, bringing its gain for the year to 6.6 percent. Not bad, considering its large, high-profile short of Herbalife has heavily cut into returns, rising nearly 40 percent year-to-date.
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Deutsche Bank raised its price target on pharmaceutical firm Actavis, which is the most popular stock among hedge funds. The investment bank said it lifted that target from $336 to $343 following Federal Drug Administration approval of the company’s drug for irritable bowel syndrome with diarrhea. “We continue to view our estimates as conservative with respect to ACT’s pipeline, as we include no value for unapproved products,” the bank added in a note to clients. The stock closed Friday at $306.82.
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Deutsche Bank also initiated coverage of Darden Restaurants with a Buy recommendation and a $72 target price. Last year activist Jeffrey Smith of New York-based Starboard Value replaced all 12 directors after winning a proxy fight. “Darden Restaurants is in the process of re-establishing its casual dining leadership position by leveraging its scale, improving its food (taste, quality, etc.) and operations, after a number of years of underperformance,” Deutsche Bank stated in a note to clients. “We believe the company’s willingness to evaluate all aspects of its business model, along with a fresh perspective from the top, can help return this storied restaurant company to its prominent position across the industry.” The stock closed Friday at $65.56.
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Mark Spitznagel, an expert on so-called tail hedging, has put out a video explaining how investors can have their cake and eat it too. The president and chief investment officer of Universa Investments, which is hired to put this hedge overlay on portfolios, explains in a partly animated more than five-minute video how he can help investors enjoy higher returns with lower risk when his hedges are added to your standard 60/40 mix of stocks and bonds. “Higher returns really can come with lower risk,” he asserts in his video.
