Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square Sells All Its Universal Music Stock

Photo Credit: Kelly Sikkema

That didn’t take long: Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square has officially offloaded its Universal Music Group (UMG) stock, and the major label itself has purchased about 14.2 million of the shares.

Universal Music disclosed the buyback this morning, moments after Pershing unveiled plans to divest its remaining UMG position following a failed takeover attempt. Although the sale’s precise timing wasn’t immediately clear, Pershing is evidently hitting eject right now.

In connection with the selloff of “the entire position owned by various Pershing Square funds,” Universal Music has specifically scooped up 14,156,285 ordinary shares. Priced at €17.66 (currently $20.53) apiece, said shares set the company back approximately €250 million ($290.60 million).

Regarding the capital powering the sizable transaction, the Downtown parent confirmed it’d used a piece of its €1 billion/$1.2 billion share-repurchase program. (Technically, this encompasses two €500 million authorizations, the newer of which bankrolled the buyback.)

At the time of writing, Universal Music stock was hovering around €18.25 ($21.21) per share on the Euronext Amsterdam – down from over €19 ($22.09) per share before Pershing’s selloff initiated.

As we explored in greater detail yesterday, Pershing/Ackman’s exit – from UMG’s stock and before that its board – marks the end of a contentious professional relationship, complete with multiple public dust-ups.

Of course, not all the split’s effects will be noticeable out of the gate. However, when pitching the $64 billion bid, Ackman described UMG investors’ purported concerns about and dissatisfaction with several components of the business’s operations.

(Even Cyrille Bolloré, who ultimately urged Universal Music brass to reject the proposal, acknowledged Ackman’s “interesting points.” Ackman seemingly has yet to directly address the Universal Music episode, but he’s actively making announcements about the two Pershing entities that recently listed, rather unsurprisingly, in the States.)

Apparently, there looks to have been a disconnect between investors’ representations behind closed doors and their public statements.

Nevertheless, these stakeholders may have gotten what they wanted out of the situation: Universal Music’s retooled its earnings reports, leaned into the aforementioned share buyback programs, and committed to selling off some of its Spotify stock.

Meanwhile, in another relatively little-discussed component of the buyout, Cyrille Bolloré expressed a willingness to part with a portion of his namesake company’s UMG shares. Though the asking price is a bit steep relative to the stock’s current positioning, which is also worth keeping in mind, the bigger takeaway is that third parties aren’t without Universal Music investment options.

Against this backdrop, and with billions upon billions of dollars still pouring into song catalogs themselves, Independent Franchise Partners scooped up 3% of Universal Music earlier in 2026. The activist investor has positions in Live Nation and Warner Music Group as well.