Peloton Investor Blackwells Capital Again Calls for Exploration of Sale / Peloton to be acquired

Peloton is again under fire from one of its activist investors, Blackwells Capital. The Financial Times is reporting that Blackwells Capital will make a presentation on Wednesday, April 13 arguing that new CEO Barry McCarthy has failed to make crucial reforms at the company.

Blackwells Capital will also continue to threaten legal action against Peloton and again calls for Peloton to look into an acquisition. According to the Financial Times:

Blackwells’ presentation notes that the stock has continued to fall since February 8, when it appointed McCarthy, a former chief financial officer of Netflix and Spotify. “Two months since Peloton hired one of the highest paid CEOs in all of corporate America, nothing has fundamentally changed,” it argues.

You can view the complete presentation on the Blackwells Capital website. The presentation is titled, “A Further Call to Action: Maximizing Value for Peloton Shareholders.” The deck examines Peloton’s governance structure, provides an overview of McCarthy’s first 60 days as the head of the company, and again pushes for a sale process.

They call for Peloton to explore a sale to Amazon, Apple, Google, Warner Brothers / Discovery, Netflix, or Nike.

Blackwells Capitals owns a nearly 5% stake in Peloton. Founder Jason Aintabi has reportedly approached other shareholders in an effort to change the shareholder structure that allows Founder and former CEO John Foley to maintain effective control of the company.

CNBC has also reported on this story and shared a statement from Aintabi:

“Two months have passed since John Foley was promoted into the role of Executive Chairman and Barry McCarthy came out of retirement to assume the post of CEO,” Jason Aintabi, chief investment officer of Blackwells, said in a statement. “Remarkably, shareholders are worse off now than before.”

Earlier this year Blackwells Capital published a letter calling for John Foley’s resignation and requesting that Peloton explore a potential sale. Though there have been reports that companies such as Nike and Amazon may be interested, McCarthy has repeatedly stressed that he is focused on long-term growth rather than a potential acquisition.

You can read the full reporting on this story from the Financial Times here.


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Katie Weicher
Katie Weicher is a writer for Pelo Buddy. She purchased her Peloton Bike in 2016 and has been riding, strength training, and yoga flowing ever since. You can find her on the leaderboard at #kweich.

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