By Svea Herbst-Bayliss
NEW YORK, Nov 14 (Reuters) - Activist investor Starboard Value has liquidated its position in Pfizer PFE.N, according to a regulatory filing on Friday, ending its push for changes aimed at boosting the drugmaker's share price.
Starboard sold roughly 8.5 million Pfizer shares during the third quarter, according to its 13-F filing which details asset managers' holdings in U.S. publicly traded companies at the end of a three-month period.
At the end of the fourth quarter 2024, the hedge fund reported owning 15.4 million Pfizer shares.
The hedge fund made a splash a year ago by announcing a roughly $1 billion stake in the drugmaker at a time its shares were trading at roughly half of the company's pandemic-era high.
Starboard founder Jeffrey Smith said at an industry conference that Pfizer's board needed to hold management accountable for its underperformance.
Starboard is one of the industry's busiest activist investors, building positions this year at travel site TripAdvisor TRIP.O, engineering firm Rogers ROG.N and financial automation software company BILL Holdings BILL.N where it quickly secured a board seat for one of its principals.
The hedge fund had approached two former Pfizer executives, including former CEO Ian Read, to help with its campaign but the cooperation soon fizzled.
Pfizer now has a market value of $142 billion compared with a market value of roughly $162 billion when Starboard's Pfizer position was revealed in October 2024.
A representative for Starboard did not respond to a request seeking comment.
Friday's filing also showed that Starboard liquidated its position in contract research organization Fortrea Holdings FTRE.O, selling 2.5 million shares during the third quarter.
The hedge fund announced its investment in Fortrea, which was spun out of Laboratory Corp in 2023, in October 2023 in a regulatory filing. The share price has dropped nearly 50% since Starboard's investment became known.
(Reporting by Svea Herbst-Bayliss; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)
((svea.herbst@thomsonreuters.com; +617 233 2138; Reuters Messaging: svea.herbst.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))