这次增持发生在Liberty Media完成重组之后，Liberty Media是亿万富翁John Malone的公司，它在9月初合并了与SiriusXM相关的股票，并将亚特兰大勇士棒球队分拆成一家独立的上市公司。伯克希尔也持有该棒球队的股份。这次重组是Malone调整其媒体帝国的一部分。Last week, Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway company spent about $87 million in multiple trades to purchase approximately 3.6 million shares of SiriusXM stocks, increasing its shareholding percentage to 32%. Despite SiriusXM facing issues with user attrition and insufficient growth potential, Berkshire may have identified a merger arbitrage opportunity, hence choosing to continue investing. The news of the shareholding increase caused SiriusXM's stock price to surge over 9.3% intraday on Monday.
Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway company recently continued to increase its shareholding in the satellite broadcasting company $Sirius XM (SIRI.US)$ and currently holds 32% of the company's shares.
According to the documents submitted by Berkshire to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, from last Wednesday to last Friday, the company purchased approximately 3.6 million shares of SiriusXM through multiple trades, with a total investment of about $87 million.
This shareholding occurred after Liberty Media completed its restructuring. Liberty Media is the company of billionaire John Malone. It merged relevant stocks with SiriusXM in early September and split off the Atlanta Braves baseball team into an independent publicly traded company. Berkshire also holds shares in this baseball team. This restructuring is part of Malone's adjustment to his media empire.
Berkshire first purchased Liberty Media tracking stock in 2016 and began heavily buying SiriusXM tracking stock in early 2024. CNBC points out that Berkshire may be eyeing merger arbitrage opportunities, hence choosing to continue investing.
Despite Buffett being 94 years old this year, he has never publicly discussed this investment. It is currently unclear whether this decision was made by him personally or handled by his two investment managers, Ted Weschler or Todd Combs.
SiriusXM is currently facing user attrition and unfavorable demographic changes, leading to its lack of popularity on Wall Street. According to FactSet data, out of 14 analysts, only 5 have a 'buy' rating for the stock. JPMorgan analyst Sebastiano Petti has a 'hold' rating, expressing concern about the company's long-term growth potential.
Furthermore, Liberty Media's restructuring resulted in a 12% reduction in the number of SiriusXM shares, potentially causing the company to suspend share buybacks until 2027, which could put pressure on the stock price. Despite Berkshire's shareholding causing SiriusXM's stock price to temporarily rise over 9.3%, the stock has still dropped by over 50% this year.
The last large-scale investment in a major media company by Berkshire Hathaway was in 2022 when it purchased Class B shares of Paramount Global. However, this investment quickly ran into trouble, as Buffett revealed in May this year that he had sold all these shares at a loss. Buffett stated that the failed investment in Paramount made him ponder more about what people value most in their leisure time. He pointed out that the streaming industry has numerous competitors all vying for consumer attention, leading to intense price wars.
Editor/Somer
