Pershing Square (Bill Ackman)

Background

Founded 2004 in New York. Runs Pershing Square Holdings (PSH), a listed closed-end vehicle on Euronext Amsterdam and the LSE. Strategy is concentrated long positions in high-quality businesses, sometimes with activist engagement, plus opportunistic macro hedges.

Key People

• Bill Ackman CEO and PM

  Public face of every campaign; concentrated decision-maker.

• Ryan Israel Chief Investment Officer (since 2022)

  Long-tenured Pershing analyst promoted to CIO.

Track Record / Style

Defining episodes: GGP 2008–2010 (large multi-bagger out of the financial crisis), Herbalife short 2012–2018 (large loss, exited), Valeant 2014–2017 (catastrophic loss, considered the firm's turning point), Chipotle since 2016 (multi-year compounding), ADP proxy fight 2017 (lost but kept the stake), the March 2020 COVID CDS hedge that reportedly returned ~$2.6B on a small premium, the Universal Music spin-off (2021), and a long-running Howard Hughes stake. Big swings, transparent letters.