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New York equity firm Elliot Management Corp., with $40 billion under management, has bought a significant number of shares of cloud-based Dropbox and told Dropbox that Eliot is now its second-largest shareholder after Dropbox CEO Drew Houston, insiders told the Wall Street Journal.
If true, that would mean Elliot now owns more than 10 percent of the shares of Dropbox, or at least $800 million worth.
Elliot and Dropbox have been in discussions for about the past year, the WSJ reported.
Dropbox issued its first round of stock in 2018, valuing its shares at between $16 and $18 each. It traded below that mark until the financial crisis when it rode the stock market’s wave higher.
As the weak performance led observers to speculate about Dropbox as a takeover target, whispers became louder after Salesforce bought Slack Technologies last year for $277 billion.
Elliot is known to be an activist investor, taking board seats in companies in which it invests and directing corporate strategy and decisions.
Elliot’s Evergreen Coast Capital subsidiary sometimes bids on companies that Elliot has targeted, the WSJ noted.
TRENDPOST: This is another example of a trend we have been documenting for years – the Bigs get bigger (see our 5 May 2020 article, “BIGS GET BIGGER, FEDS SCREW MOMS… AND POPS,” and our 25 May 2020 article, “BIGS GET BIGGER, MOM & POPS GO BUST.”)
Money and power create their own gravity, attracting more of both to themselves and leaving scraps for the rest of us to struggle over.