Activist Elliott invests tens of billions of yen in Sumitomo Corporation – Sources – Bloomberg

US hedge fund management company known as an activist investor Elliott Management is a general trading company. It was revealed that he invested tens of billions of yen in Sumitomo Corporation stock. A person with knowledge of the matter spoke on condition of anonymity because the information is private.

According to people familiar with the matter, Elliott has discussed measures to improve corporate value with Sumitomo Corporation.Elliott recently Invest in Mitsui Fudosan and sell your assets Mitsui Fu’s April capital efficiency plan calls for share buybacks issued a welcoming statement.other It invests in companies, including Dai Nippon Printing, that have cheap valuations and are seen to have the potential to return profits to shareholders.to Softbank Group Since investing in 2020, we have been actively investing in Japan. Sumitomo Corporation’s market capitalization is 4,781 billion yen (as of the 26th).

The stock prices of Japan’s five largest trading companies, including Sumitomo Corporation, are based on Berkshire Hathaway, an American investment and insurance company led by famous investor Warren Buffett. Since 2020, when the investment was announced, prices have risen sharply due to factors such as high resource prices. Comparing from the end of 2019, before the coronavirus pandemic, Sumitomo Corporation has had the smallest increase among the five companies, and its recent price-to-earnings ratio (PER) and price-to-book ratio (PBR) are also the lowest.

In response to the Tokyo Stock Exchange’s request for “management that is conscious of capital costs and stock prices,” Japanese companies are becoming more proactive in returning profits to shareholders.Among general trading companies, in February Mitsubishi Corporation sold 500 billion yen, equivalent to 10% of the total number of outstanding shares. In addition to announcing share buybacks, ITOCHU Corporation also announced in April that in addition to the 150 billion yen share buyback plan for fiscal 2024, The company announced a management plan that included targeting a total return ratio of 50%, both of which led to a significant rise in stock prices.

Sumitomo Corporation is scheduled to announce its fiscal 2023 financial results on May 2nd, and the medium-term management plan that is expected to be announced at the same time is attracting market attention.

In response to questions from Bloomberg, a spokesperson for Elliott said the company had no specific comment. A spokesperson for Sumitomo Corporation declined to comment on individual shareholders.

(Updated to add Sumitomo Corporation’s comment at the end)