Kerkorian's Tracinda has sold entire Ford stake

December 29, 2008 - 2:17 pm ET
UPDATED: 12/29/08 3:39 p.m. EST


DETROIT (Reuters) -- Billionaire investor Kirk Kerkorian has sold off all of
his remaining shares of Ford Motor Co , a spokeswoman for his investment
firm, Tracinda Corp, said today.

Tracinda, which briefly ranked as Ford's largest outside investor earlier
this year, said in a regulatory filing in October that it had begun working
with bankers to sell the 133.5 million shares of the No. 2 U.S. automaker it
still held at that time.

It was not immediately clear when Tracinda had completed those remaining
sales of Ford stock.

Kerkorian's final pullout from Ford completed a costly retreat for the
activist investor, who has a mixed track record with investments at all
three Detroit-based automakers.

A spokesman for Ford could not immediately be reached for comment.

Kerkorian, 91, previously held a nearly 10-percent stake in General Motors
and made a failed bid for Chrysler LLC last year.

He surprised analysts and investors in April when he began buying Ford
shares and spent over $1 billion to take a stake in Ford at an average price
per share of $7.10.

At its peak, Kerkorian held a 6.5 percent stake in Ford and had offered in
June to support the automaker's turnaround efforts with an infusion of
additional capital.

Ford has been widely considered to be the best-positioned of the three
Detroit automakers at a time when all three have been hit hard by declining
sales and tight credit.

When GM and Chrysler negotiated $17.4 billion of emergency loans from the
U.S. government earlier this month, Ford held back, saying it expected to be
able to weather the downturn on its own.

But conditions across the auto industry have taken a dramatic turn for the
worse since September when credit suddenly tightened for both car shoppers
and dealers.

In late October, Tracinda began selling Ford shares at $2.43, representing a
loss of almost 66 percent from what the fund paid on average.

Since then, Ford's shares have traded between a low of $1.02 in November to
a high of $3.54 earlier this month.

Ford shares fell almost 5 percent in trading on Monday to $2.18.

The Ford family holds just under 3 percent of the automaker's shares but
controls 40 percent of the voting power through a separate class of shares.

Kerkorian's offer of additional capital for Ford had been seen as an
endorsement of the company's strategy and management under CEO Alan Mulally.

But Kerkorian's record as an activist investor had also raised questions
earlier this year about whether his investment could be a threat to the Ford
family's continued control of the automaker.