Bill Ackman Calls On Universal Music Group to Move Listing to U.S.

Billionaire hedge funder and Universal Music Group board member Bill Ackman called for UMG to move its stock listing and legal headquarters to the United States from Amsterdam after violent attacks on Israeli soccer fans overnight in the Dutch capital.

Amsterdam’s Mayor Femke Halsema said fans of Maccabi Tel Aviv were attacked and “pelted with fireworks” overnight by “antisemitic hit-and-run squads” after the city’s AFC Ajax soccer team beat Maccabi in a Europa League match. At least five people were treated in hospital, Reuters reports.

Ackman, one of UMG’s largest shareholders, said on X that moving UMG’s domicile — where the company pays taxes — and where it is publicly traded from Amsterdam to the United States will have “highly material benefits” and will align the company with “moral principles.”

“Leaving a jurisdiction that fails to protect its tourists and minority populations combine both good business and moral principles,” Ackman wrote in the post which he began by writing he is seeking board approval to move Pershing Square’s listing to London.

“I have also begun the conversation with UMG (on whose board I sit) which is domiciled in Amsterdam as well as listed there, about moving its domicile and its listing to the United States, which will offer similar as well as other highly material benefits.”

Pershing Square Holdings, in which Ackman said his family has a 23% stake, owns a 10.25% of UMG’s stock. Vincent Bollore, the former chairman of Vivendi, owns 18% of UMG.

Ackman said Pershing Square will exercise its “contractual right to cause UMG to be listed in the US… and achieve a US listing for UMG no later than some time next year.”

“We have taken note of Bill Ackman’s post in relation to Pershing Square and UMG on X yesterday,” a UMG spokesperson said in a statement provided to Billboard. “Neither UMG nor any of its other board members were involved in the formulation of the views in that post. As disclosed in UMG’s listing prospectus, Pershing has the right to request a listing in the U.S. subject to a Pershing entity selling at least $500 million in UMG shares as part of the listing. Pershing does not have any right to require UMG to become a U.S. domiciled company or delist from Euronext Amsterdam. While the company will endeavor in good faith to comply with its contractual obligations with respect to undertaking the process of a U.S. listing at the request of Pershing, any actions or decisions beyond those necessary to comply (including any decisions to change the domicile of the company) will be based on an analysis taking into account what is value maximizing and in the best interests of all the shareholders of the company.”

Ackman said UMG trades at a discount and with limited liquidity in part because its primary listing is on the Euronext Amsterdam exchange, not the New York Stock Exchange or Nasdaq. It is also not being eligible to be included in the S&P 500 index or other U.S. bellwether indices

“We are going to fix this. Now is a good and appropriate time to do so,” Ackman wrote.

Universal Music went public on Amsterdam’s Euronext exchange in September 2021 with a first-day market capitalization of €45.51 billion ($53.36 billion). The company listed on the Netherlands’ exchange in part because Bollore’s Parist-based media conglomerate Vivendi still owned a substantial portion of UMG’s stock, and a rule put in place after the United Kingdom left the the European Union that required European companies to list on local exchanges was driving significant trading volume to the Euronext.

Update (11/9): This story has been updated to include comment from a spokesperson from the Universal Music Group.