Hedge Funds Stand to Win as Qualcomm Boosts Offer for NXP
Elliott, Farallon among hedge funds owning 47% stake in NXP.
(Bloomberg) -- Elliott Management Corp. and other hedge funds that own almost half of NXP Semiconductors NV are poised to reap bigger profits after Qualcomm Inc. raised its offer for the firm.
Hedge funds, including Soroban Capital Partners, Pentwater Capital Management and Farallon Capital Management, hold seven of the top 10 positions in NXP and 47 percent of the Dutch company’s total shares, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Qualcomm, which has been trying to fend off a hostile takeover by Broadcom Ltd., raised its offer for NXP by 16 percent from $110 a share to $127.50. That was enough to secure support from holders, including activist Elliott, of about 28 percent of NXP’s stock, Qualcomm said. Broadcom said its $121 billion bid for Qualcomm is contingent on the NXP deal going through at the originally agreed price.
A group led publicly by Elliott, which has a 7.2 percent exposure in NXP, had been arguing that $135 was the minimum price that Qualcomm should pay.
NXP climbed 6.1 percent to $125.68 at 11:47 a.m., the stock’s highest level since 2010. Shares climbed about 22 percent over the past year. The deal was first announced in 2016.
Elliott first acquired its stake in NXP in the second quarter of 2017, Bloomberg data show. Most of the other big hedge fund owners have held the stock even longer. HBK Investments, D.E. Shaw & Co. and Och-Ziff Capital Management Group LLC are among the top 10 holders of the stock.
--With assistance from Adam Satariano and Ian King
To contact the reporter on this story: Charles Stein in Boston at cstein4@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Margaret Collins at mcollins45@bloomberg.net, Vincent Bielski, Steven Crabill
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