Billionaire Carl Icahn is the founder and manager of Icahn Capital, one of the most feared activist hedge funds in the world. The 82-year-old investor, who has a personal fortune estimated by Forbes at $17 billion, is also the chairman and majority owner of Icahn Enterprises L.P. (NASDAQ:IEP), an investment vehicle which owns several companies, including The Pep Boys, Trump Entertainment Resorts, and Federal-Mogul.
Icahn Capital maintains a fairly concentrated portfolio and there isn’t a lot of quarterly turnover in its positions, which was evident during Q3 based on the fund’s latest 13F filing released this month. Of Icahn’s 21 13F holdings on June 30, changes were made to just 7 of those positions during Q3, two of which are essentially the same stock (DVMT and VMW). Icahn closed just one position and did not initiate any new positions during the third-quarter. The fund’s 13F portfolio was valued at $25.22 billion at the end of September.
We’ve uncovered a reliable way to consistently beat the market by using these 13F filings and investing in only the top consensus picks of the 100 best performing hedge funds each quarter. Insider Monkey’s flagship “Best Performing Hedge Funds Strategy” has returned 96.9% since its 2014 inception (through November 2), beating the market by over 40 percentage points. Check out a detailed analysis of Insider Monkey’s performance and past quarterly stock picks for all the details. Our newest picks were released this month; don’t miss out!
Below, we’ll look at five of Icahn’s small collection of moves during Q3, which included closing out one holding.
Stocks Bought in Q3
Energen Corporation (NYSE:EGN)
– Shares Bought During Q3: 2.47 million
– Value of Holding (as of September 30): $661 million
– Q4 Return (through November 23): -21.70%
– Forward P/E Ratio: 13.17
– Forward Dividend Yield: N/A
Icahn continued to add to his fund’s Energen Corporation (NYSE:EGN) position in Q3 after opening a 5.2 million-share position in Q2, 2 million of which were bought off of Icahn protege Keith Meister of Corvex Capital. With 3 prominent activists ganging up on the company, the sale that Meister had been pushing for over the last year came to fruition in August, when Energen agreed to be purchased by Diamondback Energy, Inc. (NASDAQ:FANG) for $9.2 billion.
Newell Brands Inc. (NYSE:NWL)
– Shares Bought During Q3: 5.40 million
– Value of Holding (as of September 30): $786 million
– Q4 Return (through November 23): +7.09%
– Forward P/E Ratio: 9.39
– Forward Dividend Yield: 4.62%
Newell Brands Inc. (NYSE:NWL) is another company that Icahn has teamed up with another activist on, in this case Jeffrey Smith of Starboard Value. Icahn gave up two Newell board seats in April to make way for Starboard’s nominees in order to avoid a costly proxy contest. Starboard had initially sought to wipe out the company’s entire board, which had included four seats granted to Icahn nominees in March.
Stocks Sold in Q3
Cigna Corporation (NYSE:CI)
– Shares Sold During Q3: 503,380
– Value of Holding (as of September 30): $0
– Q4 Return (through November 23): +1.40%
– Forward P/E Ratio: 13.81
– Forward Dividend Yield: 0.02%
Icahn completely sold out of Cigna Corporation (NYSE:CI) in Q3 just a quarter after first building the position and it looks like he made a nice little profit off the short-lived holding, as the stock gained 23% during Q3.
VMware, Inc. (NYSE:VMW)
– Shares Sold During Q3: 1.85 million
– Value of Holding (as of September 30): $65.77 million
– Q4 Return (through November 23): -1.97%
– Forward P/E Ratio: 23.72
– Forward Dividend Yield: N/A
Icahn boosted his stake in Dell Technologies Inc. (NYSE:DVMT), which tracks Dell’s VMware stake, by 269% in Q3 as he engaged in a proxy contest against Dell. Likely due to that move and because he didn’t want to become overexposed to VMware, Inc. (NYSE:VMW), Icahn countered by selling off 81% of his fund’s position in the actual stock. Icahn recently dropped his proxy fight with Dell after a better deal was offered which swayed other shareholders to Dell’s side, though Icahn wasn’t satisfied with the deal and believed they could’ve held out for a better offer.
Cheniere Energy, Inc. (NYSE:LNG)
– Shares Sold During Q3: 300,000
– Value of Holding (as of September 30): $1.62 billion
– Q4 Return (through November 23): -15.54%
– Forward P/E Ratio: 23.35
– Forward Dividend Yield: N/A
Icahn sold off a small 2% chunk of his Cheniere Energy, Inc. (NYSE:LNG) stake in Q3, which followed a much larger 27% cut in Q2. Icahn pushed former Cheniere CEO Charif Souki out the door in 2016 and voiced his confidence in the current management team after his large Q2 sale.
Disclosure: None
