For some of the world’s wealthiest people, the bedlam in global markets has added greater urgency to take major portfolio companies private.
As stock markets sank everywhere Monday, the investment company of South Africa-born billionaire Natie Kirsh announced that it had teamed up with U.S.-listed Public Storage on a take-private deal for Abacus Storage King. Kirsh is the biggest shareholder in the Australian self-storage group, which the offer values at about A$1.9 billion ($1.1 billion).
“The current market condition is favorable for privatization,” said Jason Saw, group head of investment banking at CGS International Securities. For billionaires, “being private enables them to reduce costs and make faster business decisions away from the scrutiny of the public.”
Others were making similar moves even before the crash sparked by the rollout of U.S. tariffs. The billionaire Maersk shipping clan said last week that it would buy all of the shares it didn’t already own in tugboat operator Svitzer Group A/S in a deal valuing the business at 9 billion Danish kroner ($1.3 billion). In late March, Olof Hallrup, the chairman of the Swedish accounting software firm Fortnox AB, agreed to partner with EQT AB on a $4.5 billion take-private offer.
“Relatively depressed share prices have created an attractive buying opportunity, particularly for companies where the road to share price recovery is unclear,” said Edward Freeman, a partner at Freshfields in Hong Kong.
With equity trading volatility at a level not seen since the early days of the COVID pandemic, savvy investors taking a long-term view are best positioned to weather the storm, said Nigel Green, CEO of the financial advisory firm deVere Group.
“It’s absolutely not the time to be on the sidelines,” Green wrote in a note. “Those who stay invested and act strategically during times like these are consistently the ones who reap the biggest rewards.”
Still, the likes of Italy’s Agnelli dynasty and Lego’s founding family have recently moved to cash in gains from listed holdings with some rare selling.
Despite many making efforts to diversify their assets, the superrich aren’t immune to the market turmoil: The world’s 500 wealthiest people just suffered the biggest three-day loss ever on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
“It is often difficult to price a privatization successfully on a short-term share price dip,” said Freeman at Freshfields. “But where there is a longer-term issue weighing on the share price, controlling shareholders or founders — who either have the capital or can raise it — are often well-placed to seize the opportunity to privatize the company and make the necessary changes.”
While equity gauges tumbled Monday, including the worst day for Australia’s benchmark index since May 2020, news of the Abacus Storage offer sent that stock careening in the other direction, rising a record 21%. Markets more broadly crawled back from the hefty losses early Tuesday.
“With markets trading the way they are, the offer is attractive,” Brian Freitas, the founder of Periscope Analytics who also publishes on the Smartkarma platform, wrote in a note on the Abacus Storage deal.
Kirsh’s fortune is mostly in Jetro Holdings Inc., a New York-based company that manages two U.S. wholesale grocery businesses. The billionaire, who was born in Potchefstroom, South Africa, started his own business in nearby Swaziland — now Eswatini — at age 26. He expanded into real estate in the 1980s, but the business was hit by an economic crisis that decade. Now, at age 93, Kirsh has a fortune estimated at $9.2 billion, the Bloomberg Billionaires Index shows.
In Europe, the Maersk family offered to take Svitzer private just a year after it started trading in Copenhagen. The Danish marine service firm has been part of the Maersk Group for more than 40 years, after Maersk became a majority shareholder in 1979.
The family’s investment unit said the listing hadn’t generated as much interest as expected. Svitzer’s shares were down almost 8% from the time of the listing in 2024 to April 1. They jumped 30% on the day of the take-private announcement.
The take-private drive has been driven by a confluence of factors, including weak valuations, an inability to raise capital at a good price, or no need to, said CGSI’s Saw. Also, billionaires, with capital on the sidelines, are buying into the businesses they know best, he said.
“There is increasing private capital looking for good businesses to invest in — including private equity, which has lots of dry powder to do acquisitions,” Saw said. “This makes it much easier for the owners to find suitable partners to take the companies private.”
Quality, resilience
However, the market downturn may test wealthy investors’ appetite to proceed on terms for take-private deals lined up before the recent market volatility.
Brazil’s Moreira Salles family launched an official bid on March 10 to take over the French packaging company Verallia SA to help one of its key investments better navigate trade tensions. On March 27, Indonesia’s ultrawealthy Widjaja family similarly announced a bid to acquire the shares of Singapore-listed Sinarmas Land Ltd. it doesn’t already own, valuing the property firm at S$1.32 billion ($978 million).
While Sinarmas Land’s share price is little changed from late March, Verallia’s has fallen more than 10% since the Moreira Salles family launched its bid for the glass-bottle manufacturer. The Latin American dynasty, which has major mining and finance assets, has a net worth of about $23 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
“We’re entering a period where quality, diversification and resilience will define success,” deVere Group’s Green said. “It’s about tilting portfolios intelligently toward strength, not sitting frozen in fear.”