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Jewish billionaire Bill Ackman and his Israeli wife Neri Oxman have bought a 4.9% stake in the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange for about $17 million. This is Ackman’s first major investment in the country since Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, sparking the war in Gaza.
The Tel Aviv Stock Exchange announced that it has sold a total of 18.5% of its shares to a group of foreign and local investors for 242 million shekels (approximately $64 million). Only Ackman and Oxman mentioned their names. The stake was previously held by Israeli banks Hapoalim Bank, Mizrahi Tefahot Bank and Israel First International Bank.
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Bill Ackman and Neri Oxman.
(Photo: Jacopo Laure/Getty Images, Gina Moon/Bloomberg)
The bulk of the proceeds will go to the stock exchange’s treasury for technology-related investments. The sale was carried out within the framework of an agreement reached about a month ago between the bank and the stock exchange, which includes the distribution of a special dividend.
The stock distribution was facilitated by investment banks Jefferies and Leader Capital Markets. The stock exchange’s CEO Ittai Ben-Ziv ordered the companies to sell their shares, citing a conflict of interest under securities laws due to the extended holding period.
In accordance with the 2017 stock exchange privatization outline, the bank was obliged to sell shares at a fixed price of NIS 5.08 per share. Although initially rejected due to the current four-fold increase in the share price, a compromise was reached to sell the shares at an agreed price and pay Sh231 million in dividends at the same time.
Since April 2021, its value has increased by just 10% on the stock exchange following an impressive initial surge in its first year of issue.
Mr. Ackman has made a number of headlines outside the investment world in recent months, including for his role in the firing of Harvard University’s president for inaction against anti-Semitism on campus. For several weeks, Ackman, founder and CEO of the Pershing Square hedge fund, used his platform on X to attack Claudine Gay. The case unfolded amid accusations that she had copied material from other academics and had not taken a strong enough stance against anti-Semitism.
The latest chapter in Mr. Ackman’s pursuit of American higher education was released earlier this month, with his wife being cast in a surprising role. Allegations of plagiarism regarding Oxman’s MIT doctoral thesis have surfaced. This comes against the backdrop of Ackman’s active role in calling for the resignation of the Ivy League school’s president, who was widely criticized for his congressional testimony regarding anti-Semitism on campus.
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