Elgin Area Chamber Of Commerce: Investor Seeks Bed Bath & Beyond Sale Or Spinoff, Office Use Rises, Stock Market Opens Week In Red

Press release from the Elgin Area Chamber of Commerce:

March 08, 2022

Investor Seeks Bed, Bath & Beyond Sale or Spinoff

One of Bed Bath & Beyond’s largest investors is putting pressure on the company to sell or spin off a portion of the business.

Billionaire Ryan Cohen, founder of videogame retailer GameStop and co-founder of online pet-products company Chewy, told the Union, New Jersey-based retailer on Sunday that the company’s turnaround strategy is too ambitious and needs to be more narrowly focused, according to a letter obtained by the Wall Street Journal.

Through his firm RC Ventures, Cohen owns 9.8% of Bed Bath & Beyond stock. In the letter, Cohen said the company has fallen behind other retailers in returning value to shareholders under Mark Tritton, who has been CEO of Bed, Bath & Beyond for about two and a half years.

“Our own experience taking Chewy from a start-up to the ultimate destination for pets leads us to believe that focusing on a core set of objectives drives superior outcomes,” the letter said. “In the case of Bed Bath, it appears that trying to execute on dozens of initiatives at once is leading to dozens of mediocre outcomes.”

Cohen said the company should explore alternatives that include selling to a well-capitalized buyer and spinning off Buybuy Baby Inc., an infant products chain Bed Bath & Beyond bought in 2007.

"Our board is committed to acting in the best interests of our shareholders and regularly reviews all paths to create shareholder value,” the company said in a statement Monday confirming the letter. It said that last year “marked the first year of execution of our bold, multi-year transformation plan, which we believe will create significant long-term shareholder value."

Office Use Rises

Employees headed back to their offices more frequently last week with mask mandates ending.

Most major metropolitan areas tracked by Falls Church, Virginia-based security firm Kastle Systems had rising office use in the week ended March 2, though a few declined.

Kastle gathers anonymous employee data from workplaces where it provides access-control technology. While it is only a sampling of buildings by one security company, the data gives a peek into how employees and employers are responding to office use during the pandemic.

The Dallas and San Antonio metropolitan areas declined while the Austin and Houston areas held steady. San Diego dropped from 26.2% to 15%.

Charlotte’s metropolitan area rebounded 11.2 percentage points to hit 47.9%, just below its level for the week ended Dec. 1 last year. Denver had a big gain as well, increasing from 36.9% the previous week to 42.9%, the highest level during the pandemic.

Stock Market Opens Week in Red

Concern that the Russia-Ukraine war could slow the U.S. economy sent major stock indices tumbling on Monday to open the week in the red.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped nearly 800 points, roughly 2.4%. The S&P 500 fell almost 3%. But the technology heavy Nasdaq felt the worst of it. It declined 3.62%, shaving off 482 points.

Sunday evening, oil prices rose considerably from Friday, with Brent Crude, the global benchmark, hitting $130 a barrel at one point. Prices fell back but not to Friday levels. Gas prices have already started rising.

Meanwhile, energy company stocks saw gains while others lost. Houston-based Baker Hughes, an energy technology company serving drillers, for example, rose 4.7% for the day.

The Dow Jones Real Estate Index, which tracks real estate investment trusts and companies affected by commercial real estate, fell 2% on Monday.

Source: www.CoStar.com

This press release was produced by the Elgin Area Chamber of Commerce. The views expressed here are the author’s own.