Bill Ackman’s Pershing square sells $1bn of stock to new investors

Pershing Square, the firm of Wall Street activist investor and short-seller Bill Ackman, has sold 10% of its equity to new investors.

The share sale, worth $1.05 billion, is seen as a potential precursor to a stock market IPO for the investment company.

“We are delighted to invite a group of world-class, long-term partners as investors in our business, which has been entirely owned by Pershing Square employees since our inception more than 20 years ago,” Pershing Square chief executive Bill Ackman said in a statement.

“This new investment will help accelerate our growth in assets under management in existing and new strategies.”

News of the share transaction follows a Wall Street Journal report last week that claimed such a deal was being worked on, as a precursor to Pershing Square going public with an IPO.

In today’s statement, the investment company also detailed a change in the group’s ownership  structure which sees the ‘voting securities’ of the company being transferred to a limited liability company to be controlled by senior management including Bill Ackman, who is the largest shareholder.