Billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman revealed on Friday that his activist investment firm has bought up approximately $2 billion worth of shares of Uber — sending the ride-share company’s stock surging.
Uber shares were trading at more than 9% higher at around 1 p.m. Eastern Time on Friday after Ackman wrote on X that his company, Pershing Square Capital Management, has a stake in the app that amounts to around 1% of its $161.13 billion market capitalization.
“Beginning in early January, we began acquiring a position in @Uber. Today, we own 30.3 million shares,” Ackman wrote on X on Friday.
In his X post on Friday, Ackman alluded to Uber’s chaotic management under its controversial co-founder Travis Kalanick and praised the current chief executive officer, Dara Khosrowshahi.
“While a great business, Uber suffered from erratic management,” the billionaire hedge fund manager wrote.
“Since he joined the company in 2017, CEO Dara Khosrowshahi has done a superb job in transforming the company into a highly profitable and cash-generative growth machine,” according to Ackman.
“We believe that Uber is one of the best managed and highest quality businesses in the world,” Ackman wrote. “Remarkably, it can still be purchased at a massive discount to its intrinsic value.”
Ackman wrote that “this favorable combination of attributes is extremely rare, particularly for a large cap company.”
“We will have more to share about our thinking on the company shortly.”
Under Khosrowshahi’s watch, Uber went public in May 2019 with one of the largest IPOs in history, but its stock initially struggled, debuting at $45 per share and falling below its IPO price for an extended period due to concerns over profitability.
Since then, Uber has rebounded, becoming consistently profitable — with its stock recently surging past $75 as investors gain confidence in its long-term growth.
Ackman said that he first became intrigued with Uber when actor Edward Norton, an angel investor and one of the first to scoop up shares of the company, showed him the app.
Norton, the star of hit films such as “Fight Club,” “Primal Fear” and “The 25th Hour,” was friendly with Kalanick, which earned the actor the distinction of being the first-ever Uber passenger in Los Angeles.
“I met Travis … back when [Uber] was still kind of this funky little experiment in San Francisco, and I was super-impressed by what he was doing,” the “A Complete Unknown” actor told ABC late night host Jimmy Kimmel in 2014.
“As someone who’s had a long-standing antipathy and occasional physical battle with New York cab drivers, I begged him to bring it to New York City. Begged him.”
The Post has sought comment from Norton and Uber.
Kalanick co-founded Uber in 2009 and helped turn it into a global ride-hailing giant, but his aggressive leadership style led to rapid expansion and controversy.
His tenure was marked by scandals, including reports of a toxic workplace culture, regulatory battles and the mishandling of a high-profile sexual harassment case — which led to investor pressure for his resignation in 2017.
Despite his exit, Kalanick is credited for playing a key role in revolutionizing transportation, and Uber remains one of the most influential tech companies in the world.
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