Man Not Bird | Money Stuff: The Podcast

Bill Ackman’s latest closed-end fund plan is built around a familiar problem: closed-end funds usually trade at a discount, and investors know it. The host argues that Pershing Square is trying to overcome that by bundling shares of the management company with the fund purchase, so buyers get extra value on day one and hopefully the package trades above the $50 IPO price. The discussion also notes that the underlying portfolio is mostly large-cap public stocks; what investors are really buying is Ackman’s ability to pick winners and his public brand.

The hosts then turn to private credit, where redemption pressure and skepticism about marks are getting worse. A large BlackRock/HPS vehicle gated redemptions after requests topped its cap, which the host says is exactly what private credit is supposed to do when liquidity is limited. Apollo’s answer is to mark assets more frequently, possibly even daily, to reduce NAV arbitrage and convince investors the portfolio is not secretly deteriorating. JP Morgan’s markdowns on loans backing private credit funds add to the sense that outside financing sources may be more conservative than the funds themselves.

The episode closes with prediction markets and the legal and regulatory headaches around betting on war or assassination. A lawsuit over Kalshi’s Iran-related contracts raises the question of whether fine print is enough for consumer-facing markets, while Polymarket’s founder frames the pushback as resistance to innovation. The host treats that as a warning sign that some “innovation” is really just a new way to package dangerous bets.