Canadian pension sells Palantir stake, slashes AT&T holdings
PSP Investments has made significant stock moves in a recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, according to a report by Barron's. The Canadian pension, managing around $180 billion in assets, exited its investment in data-analytics firm Palantir Technologies and reduced its AT&T holdings.
Despite Palantir's strong performance, notably a 150 percent surge in the first nine months of the year, the pension sold its entire Palantir stock in the third quarter, totaling 111,432 shares held as of June.
Meanwhile, AT&T experienced an 18 percent decline in the first nine months. An early July investigation by The Wall Street Journal uncovered that AT&T, along with other telecom companies, had legacy lead-sheathed cables that posed a hidden risk of lead contamination.
Despite AT&T and its counterparts asserting that the cables under their ownership posed no public-health threat or contribution to environmental lead, the revelation led to a decline in AT&T stock. While analysts deemed that the market's reaction was excessive, PSP Investments responded by selling 360,747 AT&T shares and retained 765,781 shares by the end of the third quarter.
Increased stakes in Intel, Nvidia
On the flip side, the pension increased its investment in Intel by acquiring an additional 840,614 shares in the third quarter, bringing its total to 1.5 million shares. Intel's stock had risen 35 percent in the first nine months of the year, with a 20 percent increase in the fourth quarter.
PSP Investments also upped its position in Nvidia, acquiring 128,491 more shares in the third quarter, reaching a total of 656,780 shares. Nvidia, which has been key player in the AI chip market, nearly tripled its stock value in the first nine months of the year, with a 9.2 percent increase in the fourth quarter.
