Third Point Management is a New York-based hedge fund founded by Daniel S. Loeb in 1995. The firm operates as an employee-owned and SEC-registered investment advisor.
Third Point primarily invests in public equity, fixed income, and ADR markets globally and deploys an investment strategy that capitalizes on companies “undergoing events such as spinoffs or bankruptcies and pushes for corporate change". It also manages Third Point Reinsurance, a property and casualty reinsurer, and Third Point Offshore Investors, a UK-based closed-end investment company. Third Point's funds include: Third Point Partners, Third Point Opportunities Master Fund, Third Point Ultra Master Fund, and Third Point Resources. Third Point Ventures, its capital arm, invests in startup technology alternative energy and clean technology companies.
Headquartered in New York City, the firm also has six additional offices: in Sunnyvale, California; Los Angeles, California; Stamford, Connecticut; Bangalore, India; Hong Kong; and London.
Stakeholdings
Massey Energy
After a proxy fight, Third Point announced in June 2006 that Loeb and an ally, Todd Q. Swanson, would join the board of Massey Energy, the fourth-largest coal producer in the United States. The New York Times reported that Third Point owned 5.9% of Massey and that Loeb had been “feuding with the company for several months”, criticizing the management and bringing attention to executive trips to the Bahamas, Las Vegas, and West Palm Beach, Florida, on the company jet.
In one note, Loeb wrote, “Massey's C.E.O. is provided a company-owned home to live in ... In fact, after he leaves the company, the house is to be given to him as a parting gift. No one else at the company gets free housing, much less an entire home as a retirement gift. What kind of example does it set when a C.E.O. who makes $33.7 million in a single year is given free housing while the company is having difficulty retaining its mine workers?”
Acorda Therapeutics
In February 2007, Loeb asked Acorda Therapeutics, in which Third Point had a 9.9% stake, to sell itself to a larger U.S. pharmaceutical firm, arguing that a larger company with more experience “would be able to expedite Fampridine SR”, a multiple sclerosis drug produced by Acorda, through the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval process "and into the hands of patients more quickly and efficiently”. He argued that if Acorda were to continue going it alone or to seek partnership with a European firm it “would be a tremendous injustice not only to multiple sclerosis patients, who should receive such an effective drug in the most expeditious manner possible, but also to your public shareholders, who have supported Fampridine SR's development”. His letter sent Acorda shares up nearly 6.9%.
Acorda responded with a statement indicating that its board of directors “continually evaluates ways to maximize shareholder value and to serve the best interests of all shareholders”. In May 2007, Third Point disclosed that it had lowered its stake in Acorda to 4.1%.
Yahoo
Board appointment
After Third Point disclosed its stake in Yahoo on September 8, 2011, calling for the resignations of four directors, Yahoo set up a conference call with Loeb, Jerry Yang of Yahoo, and one of the directors in question, Roy Bostock. Loeb said that the conversation concluded with “Mr. Bostock’s abrupt unilateral termination of the call”. Bostock, however, claimed that he had “said that he had other shareholders to attend to and ended the phone call”.