Photographer: Michael Nagle / Bloomberg
Photographer: Michael Nagle / Bloomberg
Morgan Stanley sold $ 5 billion in shares owned by Archegos Capital Management a day before a deluge of block trades sent shock waves across the capital markets.
The March 25 sale of the basket of shares was completed at a fixed discount, according to a person with knowledge of the matter, who asked not to be identified when discussing private transactions.
The Wall Street bank sold shares of Bill Hwang’s family office in about 10 companies after the market closed, mostly to hedge funds, the person said. CNBC reported on the size of the stock sale earlier Tuesday.
Morgan Stanley’s early bid for the exits helped the company emerge largely unscathed from a fund outage that caused billions in losses to other banks. Credit Suisse Group AG announced a Tuesday $ 4.7 billion in write-off linked to its exposure to Archegos, and Nomura Holdings Inc. has said it could take a hit of a whopping $ 2 billion.
Morgan Stanley was one of the family office’s first backers, despite Hwang’s legal slur. He was charged by authorities with insider trading and pleaded guilty to wire transfer fraud on behalf of his hedge fund, Tiger Asia Management in 2012.
A Morgan Stanley spokesman declined to comment.
Read more: Credit Suisse Bid on Archegos Fix Ends With Banks Brawling
– With the help of Sridhar Natarajan