Bill Ackman Just Bought Visa, Mastercard, and S&P Global Stock. Each One Collects a Toll on Somebody Else's Sale.
Bill Ackman's Pershing Square fund has made a significant $3.3 billion investment in Visa, Mastercard, and S&P Global. These companies were chosen for their business model of collecting transaction fees without taking on direct financial risk.
Why it matters
This move highlights a strategic shift in one of the world's most concentrated hedge funds toward 'toll-booth' business models, signaling confidence in the long-term stability of financial infrastructure.
Bill Ackman doesn't buy much. Pershing Square ( PS +0.12% ) runs one of the most concentrated portfolios in fund management (just 14 companies as of June 30), and new names show up rarely.
So a quarter in which the fund opened three positions of about $1.1 billion each is unusual. That's what Pershing Square's latest 13F filing, which landed in mid-August, revealed. The fund bought Visa ( V +0.51% ) , Mastercard ( MA +0.60% ) , and S&P Global ( SPGI +1.72% ) during the second quarter -- three stakes worth about $3.3 billion at quarter-end.
And the three purchases share one trait. Each company collects a small fee on transactions it doesn't originate, fund, or take risk on.
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