Categories: OLD Media Moves

TheStreet.com targeted by activist investor as CEO steps down

TheStreet.com, which today announced that CEO Daryl Otte is stepping down, is under attack by an activist investment fund called FiveT Capital, reports Eric Savitz of Forbes.

Savitz writes, “The Zurich-based fund, run a German investor named Johannes Minho Roth, has acquired a 6.3% stake in the company. FiveT disclosed the stake in a form 13D filing with the SEC.

“The filing included a copy of a letter the firm sent to the board of TheStreet, agitating for change and requesting a board seat. The letter points out that the company’s market cap is less than its balance sheet cash, and suggesting that the company’s assets might be worth more sold off in pieces.

“Here’s a copy of the letter:

To the Members of the Board,
As strategic investors, we (FiveT Capital AG, the Advisor of the FiveMore Fund) believe in the long-term perspectives of TheStreet. However, after years of patience, we now feel the time has come to take immediate action and are expressing our views to the board in public.
TheStreet is in urgent need of a strategic and financial review to ascertain best options for shareholders.”

Read more here.

Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.