Arnd Wiegmann/Reuters
Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman.
- Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman told an audience on Thursday he wishes he could consider buying Bloomberg LP, the financial giant that would go up for sale if Mike Bloomberg became president.
- But Schwarzman can't because the PE shop is a large investor in one of Bloomberg's main competitors, Refinitiv.
- "I wish we could look at that," he said, musing that there could be business improvements through shedding its TV unit. "They have a very good business."
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Earlier this month Mike Bloomberg's presidential campaign said that the former New York City mayor would sell his financial information behemoth, Bloomberg LP, in the event that he became president in the 2020 election, fueling speculation about who might acquire it if that happened.
If this were to occur, one person who would likely experience some FOMO is Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman, and the private-equity titan expressed as much at a massive industry gathering in Berlin on Thursday.
"I wish we could look at that," said Schwarzman, speaking on-stage in an interview with Miriam Gottfried of The Wall Street Journal. "They have a very good business."
Any Bloomberg sale to Blackstone won't happen, though, because the PE shop bought one of Bloomberg's large competitors in the financial information business, Refinitiv, which was carved out of Thomson Reuters in 2018 and then sold to the London Stock Exchange last year.
Blackstone remains a large investor despite the change of control to LSE.
But Schwarzman said that he doesn't think Bloomberg LP would go to any of Blackstone's competitors either, pointing to the size of the company, saying it was "awfully big" and that it would be "difficult to make acceptable returns for investors."
"You could save money by getting rid of the TV business," Schwarzman noted, but ultimately said that he felt PE ownership "couldn't and shouldn't" happen.
Schwarzman is no stranger to Bloomberg's company. He actually considered becoming a large investor in Bloomberg LP during its infancy, years ago, in a deal that would have given him 20 percent ownership of the company. But no deal came to fruition because Bloomberg wanted his long-term loyalty, he said.
As Schwarzman recalled it, Bloomberg told him that he was never going to sell his business and that he wanted Schwarzman as a full-time business partner. Schwarzman told Bloomberg that he could commit to 12 years, and then Bloomberg backed out.
"He said, '12 years is nothing,'" said Schwarzman, "He said no deal."
At the time, a 20% stake would have required $100 million from Schwarzman, he said. "I think the company is worth now like $60 billion. So 20 percent of that would be, like, a lot."
He said that when he sees Bloomberg today, he joked that he feels like a "numb nuts."