Sacklers’ Ski Resort Sale Gives Rare Peek Into Family Office
Sacklers’ Ski Resort Sale Gives Rare Peek Into Family Office
(Bloomberg) -- A branch of the Sackler family is set to receive more than $100 million from the sale of a ski resort company, offering a rare glimpse into the sprawling fortune of the family at the center of the opioid epidemic.
Relatives of the late Raymond Sackler hold a 54% stake in Peak Resorts Inc., which operates 17 ski areas including New York’s Hunter Mountain and Mount Snow in Vermont. Vail Resorts Inc. completed its acquisition of Peak on Tuesday, two months after the deal was announced.
The Sacklers own stock and warrants through Delaware-based Cap 1 LLC, which has held a stake since at least 2015, according to regulatory filings. Beneficiaries of the trust that owns Cap 1 include Raymond’s widow Beverly, son Richard and grandson David. They’re among the eight family members accused in state lawsuits of contributing to the nationwide public-health crisis that has killed hundreds of thousands of Americans from overdoses.
It’s unclear how much profit the Sacklers reaped from the ski resort deal, because some stock purchases may not have been publicly disclosed. Vail is paying $11 a share for Peak Resorts, a 116% premium over its July 22 closing price. That would value the Sackler stake at $114 million, according to calculations by Bloomberg.
Davidson Goldin, a spokesman for portions of the Sackler family, didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Purdue Bankruptcy
Heirs of Raymond and Mortimer Sackler gained notoriety over the past several years as the opioid crisis worsened. Their wealth is founded on drug company Purdue Pharma Inc., maker of the painkiller OxyContin.
Purdue filed for bankruptcy this month to settle claims that it pushed sales of the addictive drug. The Chapter 11 filing is designed to short-circuit more than 2,000 lawsuits against Purdue and the Sackler family by the states, cities and counties that have sued to recoup billion of dollars they spent battling opioid addictions and overdoses. Under a settlement proposal, the governments, hospitals and individuals suing Purdue would take ownership from the Sacklers, who have also agreed to pay at least $3 billion and to sell other assets. Such a deal would be expected to raise a total of more than $10 billion.
Opponents argue Purdue’s plan isn’t enough of a reckoning for the Sacklers, who made billions from the over-prescribing of OxyContin by doctors, spurred by the company’s marketing. The family got more than $4 billion from OxyContin sales from 2008 through 2015, court filings show.
The lawsuits describe a web of trusts, holding entities and investment vehicles comprising the Sackler fortune, including Summer Road LLC, a family office run by David A. Sackler that provides investment-management services to Cap 1.
Summer Road has also invested in hedge fund strategies and bought an office building in West Palm Beach, Florida, for $6.8 million, the Palm Beach Post reported last week. It also owned 8% of eye-care product developer Ocular Therapeutix Inc. and about 7% of Correvio Pharma Corp. as of June 30, according to its latest 13-F filing.
--With assistance from Tom Maloney.
To contact the reporters on this story: Emma Vickers in New York at evickers4@bloomberg.net;Tom Metcalf in London at tmetcalf7@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Pierre Paulden at ppaulden@bloomberg.net, Steven Crabill, Peter Eichenbaum
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