Herbalife Ltd. (NYSE:HLF) shares climbed as much as 3 percent after CNBC reported that another major hedge fund has taken a long position in the company. Sources told CNBC that Perry Capital took a new long position in the nutritional supplements company within the last six weeks.
Herbalife and the battle of the hedge fund titans
According to those sources, the fund’s position in Herbalife Ltd. (NYSE:HLF) is less than 5 percent. They said Perry Capital believes that Herbalife shares are cheap and that the company isn’t a pyramid scheme, as activist investor and Pershing Square hedge fund manager Bill Ackman claims.
Perry Capital is just the latest in a long line of major investors to take a position in Herbalife. Ackman started the brouhaha late last year when he announced a $1 billion short position in the company and called it a pyramid scheme. Since then, other hedge fund titans like Carl Icahn, Dan Loeb and George Soros have waded into the fray.
Soros was one of the more recent managers to join. He took a long position earlier this month. Icahn also went long earlier this year. Loeb cashed out his Herbalife Ltd. (NYSE:HLF) position some time during the first quarter of the year.
Controversy surrounding Herbalife continues
Shares of Herbalife have risen 75 percent since Ackman’s big announcement last December. In fact, shares of other multi-level marketing companies have also done remarkably well since Ackman called attention to the business model.
However, various controversies keep cropping up here and there, putting the stock’s increase on pause. Shares fell on Monday after news about the death of one of the company’s distributors. Also investigators are looking into reports about safety concerns surrounding one of Herbalife Ltd. (NYSE:HLF)’s products two years ago. The company claims that the unsafe product never left its warehouse, although investors are probing the company’s practices in light of the revelation that it did not destroy the unsafe product.
