Mets Owner Steve Cohen’s Firm Discloses Large Stake in Fox Corp.

Alex Weprin
·2 min read

A high-profile investor has disclosed a significant stake in Fox Corp.

Steve Cohen, the hedge fund billionaire and owner of the New York Mets on Tuesday revealed that his firm, Point72, now owns about 5 percent of Fox’s shares, with a market value of about $350 million as of writing.

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Point72 owns just shy of 10 million shares, with another 2.37 million exercisable in options. The company disclosed the holdings on a form 13G with the Securities and Exchange Commission, suggesting that it is a passive investment (active investments are usually filed on form 13D).

While Cohen is one of the most high-profile investors in the country (the character of Bobby “Axe” Axelrod in the Showtime series Billions is loosely based on Cohen), he is not known for running activist campaigns. Instead, Point72 is known for identifying opportunistic investments that other firms may have missed, and making large, concentrated bets on them.

In the case of Fox, it could be because of the potential for a larger deal or sale, or a bet that its strategic position is a strong one. Fox, for example, will bring its live sports to streaming for the first time later this year in a bundled offering with Disney and Warner Bros. Discovery.

Filings suggest that Point72 accumulated most of its Fox holdings in recent weeks. In its last quarterly report, filed in February, Point72 reported owning about 740,000 shares of Fox.

Fox Corp. owns the Fox broadcast network, Fox News and Tubi, among other businesses.

Fox, of course, was founded by Rupert Murdoch, and the Murdoch family effectively controls the company, with 42.9 percent of voting shares. Point72’s 5 percent stake would make it the fourth largest shareholder in the company, after only the Murdochs and the index fund managers Vanguard and Dodge & Cox.

A spokesperson for Point72 declined to comment on the investment, and a spokesperson for Fox declined to comment.

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