Reuters: Hot Stocks: UPDATE 1-Nelson Peltz reports stakes in Mondelez, PepsiCo; shares up

Reuters: Hot Stocks Reuters.com is your source for breaking news, business, financial and investing news, including personal finance and stocks. Reuters is the leading global provider of news, financial information and technology solutions to the world's media, financial institutions, businesses and individuals. // via fulltextrssfeed.com

UPDATE 1-Nelson Peltz reports stakes in Mondelez, PepsiCo; shares up Apr 19th 2013, 18:15 Fri Apr 19, 2013 2:15pm EDT (Adds background; updates shares) April 19 (Reuters) - Activist investor Nelson Peltz has amassed stakes in Mondelez International Inc and PepsiCo Inc worth more than $900 million, a regulatory filing on Friday showed, sending shares of both snack makers higher. The filing by Peltz's Trian Fund Management LP confirmed a newspaper report in March that said Trian had invested in both stocks. The report also said Peltz might push for a merger of the two. Analysts have long speculated on the merits of a breakup of PepsiCo that would separate its drinks and Frito-Lay snacks businesses. Some have cited value in combining Frito-Lay's salty snacks with Mondelez's Oreo cookies, Cadbury chocolate and Trident gum. PepsiCo said on Friday that it has held meetings with Trian in recent weeks "to discuss and consider their ideas and initiatives." It did not say what the ideas were. A Trian spokeswoman declined to comment. Mondelez declined to comment on the Trian stake, but said it was focused on "leveraging its advantaged category mix, leading market positions and strong geographic footprint." In Friday's filing, which represented Trian's holdings at the end of last year, it said it had 19.4 million shares of Mondelez, representing a 1.09 percent stake, and about 3.9 million shares, or 0.25 percent, of PepsiCo. Based on the companies' stock prices at Thursday's close, a combined stake of that size would be worth $903.9 million. PepsiCo announced a turnaround plan in February 2012 after its share price had been stagnant for about five years. Its North American drinks business has been losing share to that of Coca-Cola as it focused on healthier products. Mondelez shares rose 4.8 percent to $31.55 on Nasdaq, while PepsiCo climbed 1.6 percent to $82.53 on the New York Stock Exchange. (Reporting by Siddharth Cavale in Bangalore and Jessica Wohl in Chicago; Editing by Sreejiraj Eluvangal and Richard Chang) Link this Share this Digg this Email Reprints

You are receiving this email because you subscribed to this feed at blogtrottr.com. If you no longer wish to receive these emails, you can unsubscribe from this feed, or manage all your subscriptions