BILL ACKMAN: Herbalife Looks Just Like A Company The Feds Accused Of Being A Pyramid Scheme
Late last year, Ackman publicly announced that he's shorting more than a 20 million shares of Herbalife, a multi-level marketing firm that sell nutrition products.
The premise of his short thesis is that he believes the company is a pyramid scheme and that the government will be induced to investigate the company. Ackman has a price target of zero on his short. In other words, he thinks the company will fail.
Taking the other side, a number of hedge fund managers have snapped up big long positions in Herbalife, most notably Daniel Loeb of Third Point and Ackman's long-time rival Carl Icahn.
Ackman's latest presentation compares Herbalife to Fortune Hi-Tech Marketing, a multi-level marketing company that was accused of operating as a pyramid scheme by the Federal Trade Commission and Attorneys General from Kentucky, North Carolina and Illinois.
We've included his new slide deck "Side-by-Side: A Comparison of Fortune Hi-Tech Marketing and Herbalife" in the slides that follow.