An activist hedge fund backed by Paul Singer’s Elliott Management yesterday sent a letter to the BOD OF Arconic (along with Elliott Management) is demanding changes at the giant formerly known as the famous Alcoa by the activist hedge fund, Lion Point Capital. ValueWalk has exclusively obtained a full copy of the letter which can be found below.
Also see 2016 Hedge Fund Letters
Lion Point Capital’s letter to members of the Board of Directors Of Arconic.
Members of the Board of Directors of Arconic Inc.:
Klaus Kleinfeld, Chairman
Amy Alving
Arthur Collins, Jr.
Rajiv Gupta
Sean Mahoney
E. Stanley O’Neal
John Plant
L. Rafael Reif
Julie Richardson
Patricia Russo
Ulrich Schmidt
Sir Martin Sorrel]
Ratan Tata
cc: Kate Ramundo, Chief Legal Officer
Dear Board Members:
Lion Point Capital, LP (together with its affiliates, “Lion Point”) has been a shareholder in Alcoa since 2015 and we continue to be invested in Arconic Inc. (“Arconic”, or the “Company”) post the spin-off of the primary products businesses. Lion Point believes that the intrinsic value of Arconic materially exceeds the Company’s current stock price, and we welcome and support Elliott Management Corporation’s (“Elliott”) plan to unlock this value.
Lion Point Capital
Over the last couple of years, Lion Point has spent significant time and resources to understand the Company, including evaluating its historical operating performance and competitive position. While we see tremendous value and potential in Arconic’s world class assets, the market applies a persistent discount to what our analysis indicates to be fair value based on both private and public peer valuations.
We believe that the discount and consequent sub-par shareholder returns witnessed overtime are attributed to what objectively (both on a relative and absolute basis) can be described as poor capital allocation, significant and recurring execution missteps, undisciplined spending and miscommunication with the investment community. There is a stark dichotomy between the potential of the underlying assets and the results to date from their management. The burden and cost of this dichotomy have been borne by shareholders.
Lion Point believes that prudent capital allocation, disciplined cost control, focused execution and clear communication about the path forward are key to charting a new course for Arconic, and can drive substantial shareholder returns from here. Lion Point believes that Elliott’s plan for value creation can reverse the past and set new Arconic on a better path to creating shareholder value.
Unfortunately, the Company has engaged in a counterproductive (and ill-advised) PR campaign to defend against ideas that can dramatically improve the Company. Shareholders should not bear any longer the burden of such a purpose-defeating and value-destructive distraction, and we recommend that the Board promptly engage with Elliott in discussions to implement a plan to enhance shareholder value – much work lies ahead.
Respectfully,
Didric Cederholm
Chief Investment Officer
Lion Point Capital
Jim Freeman
Head of Research
Lion Point Capital
