Actelion Said to Bar Some Hedge Funds From Investor Presentation
Actelion CEO Jean-Paul Clozel
Lucas Schifres/Bloomberg
Jean-Paul Clozel, chief executive of Actelion.
Jean-Paul Clozel, chief executive of Actelion. Photographer: Lucas Schifres/Bloomberg
Actelion Ltd. is preventing some hedge fund shareholders from attending a presentation at the biotechnology company’s headquarters this week, according to two people with knowledge of the situation.
Actelion is limiting attendance at the Feb. 17 event in Allschwil, Switzerland, to the company’s largest shareholders and to research analysts from investment banks, according to the people, who declined to be identified because their discussions with the company were confidential.
Hedge funds have been following Actelion because of speculation that Switzerland’s largest biotechnology company may be acquired. Amgen Inc. has been considering a takeover bid for the company, people familiar with the situation said in November. Actelion also has come under pressure from Elliott Advisors (UK) Ltd., its largest shareholder, which is pushing the company to consider a sale. Chief Executive Officer Jean- Paul Clozel has said Actelion should remain independent.
“This is not a shareholder meeting,” Roland Haefeli, a spokesman for Actelion, said in a telephone interview. “This is a sellside-driven analyst event that for full disclosure purposes is being made available to all investors via webcast. The AGM of shareholders is in early May and immediately after the analyst day, the company will reach out to investors via a roadshow.”
Funds that tried to sign up for the presentation were told that the meeting is reserved for investment-bank analysts and certain large investors, according to one shareholder. Investors are being told they can follow the presentation via a webcast, he said.
Actelion’s Progress
The investor-relations page of the company’s website says the event is “for members of the press, institutional investors, and sell-side analysts who closely follow Actelion’s progress.” The presentation occurs on the day the company announces 2010 earnings.
Elliott, part of a $17 billion hedge fund founded by Paul Singer, will be at the event, another person familiar with the situation said.
The fund said in a letter Feb. 7 that it’s concerned Actelion’s strategy may destroy shareholder value. Elliott also said Actelion should reveal “formal or informal approaches” about a potential sale and how the board will evaluate future expressions of interest.
A previous letter from Elliott called for the resignation of Actelion Chairman Robert Cawthorn and for Clozel to step down from the board. The fund will propose the steps at the annual shareholder meeting May 5. Actelion says the proposals “risk destabilizing the company.”
Insomnia Pill
Hedge funds are mostly private pools of capital whose managers participate substantially in the profits from their speculation on whether the price of assets will rise or fall. Betting on mergers and acquisitions is a common hedge fund strategy.
The Swiss company has had several setbacks over the past year. Actelion said Jan. 28 it halted development of an experimental insomnia pill because of concern that patients wouldn’t be able to tolerate the medicine. The company’s Tracleer medicine, which dominates the market for a lung condition called pulmonary arterial hypertension, failed a test to widen its use last year. The clazosentan drug didn’t help patients who had suffered from bleeding in the brain in another study.
Clozel, a former scientist with Roche Holding AG, founded Actelion in 1997 to develop medicines that Basel, Switzerland- based Roche had given up on.
To contact the reporter on this story: Dermot Doherty in Geneva at ddoherty9@bloomberg.net; Alexis Xydias in London at axydias@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Phil Serafino at pserafino@bloomberg.net
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