coke." it motivated you. >> i made it clear, i respect warren buffet and i like him and i know him and i think he was wrong, definitely wrong in saying that, you know, you don't want to upset -- i don't -- the establishment, so to speak, you know the board should, you know, and he even said, which is sort of amazing that there are plenty of things i voted for that i don't agree with. that's not what the board is supposed to do. even talking about what peltz says, i think the board's job isn't necessarily to micromanage. i'm not going to criticize nelson about the fact that maybe he is so -- and i can't talk about nelson, because i can't know if this is true, i see by his record that some of it might be, that he really is an expert on brands. in that unique situation, i think that's fine. but what a board should be doing

is the opposite of what they do and even what an activist is doing, is not micromanage. you can't go into companies, einstein i don't believe could go in to these board meetings and be on all these boards that people are on and really understand what the hell they're talking about and they're doing. these boards are a farce -- >> you thought it was big shareholder warren buffet by abstaining even though he disagrees, that would have made a statement, you would have come out and said, oh, this is wrong? >> i think he over the years has pretty much said what i've said about a lot of these ceos in a lot of these companies, i don't think he's a great fan of a lot of them. i won't speak for warren buffet. that's not a big issue to me. i do respect warren. but i will say to you that in that system, we have a real problem. we have a real problem in our

economic society, that what is going on our companies are not productive enough. i'm the living proof of it. if i can make this kind of money, i am the proof that there is something wrong. i will be the first to say it. because can i go in. yeah, i'm not going to say, i'm not a part is guy and i did well in math and stuff like that, but if you can't -- but if you can go into these companies and make the kind of main that we make. we do the strategy. we get in there. there is something wrong. because why isn't the board making, getting the ceo to either produce or get him out? in other words, what a board should do, this is my point. what a board should do is not tell the ceo what to do. they should leave him alone, really, leave him alone, but what they should say if you are not producing and they could have a lot of ways to gauge that, which we do, a lot of parameters, and if you are not coming up with, you are not

doing as well as your peer group, get off the golf course and get to work and stop woirk about what plane you have. i can't tell you how many ceos when we're there, they'll spend 20 minutes talking about, is the bell stream better than the fam conwe're going to buy? really, it gets to a point it's absurd. >> i think buffet's point, in part, look, just because you disagree with somebody in his response to you, will be like why can't you talk it out with them behind the scenes? why do you have to be such a flame thrower? i think our style actually would be more effective than the style that might be proposed by carl, he said. >> well. >> just a clash of styles? >> i don't know. you know, if he's saying more effective than coca-cola or what he's saying, but i certainly will tell you that i'll show you all these companies we've gotten on the boards with, they weren't welcoming with open arms at the beginning, maybe later, but i didn't get any invitations from them to go on the board.

so i don't think they want guys like me on the board, because they don't want to be, they don't want the boat rocked. >> buffet says ceos are terrified of activists. do you feel that way? >> why is that bad? i mean, if a ceo is doing a good job, he isn't terrified of me. really, they will even say, they're not -- i've helped them quite a bit. i'll give you nails. i still have dinner brett brown of motorola. he loved me. get him on like peltz, i don't know what he will tell you. we don't want this guy on the week, he's a pain in the ass, i don't know what he'll say. i'm just thinking of him. we liked him. he helped us at port rolla. there was a ceo we really didn't like that didn't welcome us on the board when we got on, but there were many ceos that i like. hey, i'm sure you will bring it up anyway at time warner. we went to time warner, we gave

them the road map of what to do and finally they did it. and jeff bukus came in. look, i think he did a very good job. now, i don't know the company well anymore. i'm not going to opine on whether the fox feels better or worse for shale. i'm not going to do that. i think jeff will tell you if call him. i haven't spoken to him. we left the company many years ago, but i think jeff would tell you that we helped, that what we did helped to change things. i couldn't win any protection fight there. it was a little more difficult then because you have a dysfunctional system and a lot of large funds don't want to join. now, it's interesting, a lot of the large mutual funds are interested if talking to me. they're interested in getting together. because i want to beat the index funds. but it's still hard. the hedge funds, of course, will always generally be with me. a lot of the funds today, you'd be surprised, of the calls i get, you know, from some of these funds, because they all

know, i hate to say it this way, they all know to the extent of the company we're talking about that i'm right. nobody argues when you say they got terrible management, a lot of companies i'm involved with. nobody will argue that family dollar has a bad management is not good there. you look at their record. and yet, where do you keep them? >> peltz is on the board. he said today he's not satisfied with how things have been going. >> there you go. how come he's not putting his brand in there and doing all that magic? i'm joking, because i think nelson is a capable guy. i think he really is. >> you brought up family dollar. let's go there. you sort of made your intentions well known with family dollar. you've threatened to throw the whole board out. did nelson call you about that, by the way? >> no. . he's on the board. he can't talk about it. and i wouldn't expect him to. >> the prospects of this whole scenario have changed a bit. dollar general, which you wanted

family dollar to sell itself to is having a leadership change, which sort of muddies the dollars, right the dollar general ceo is leaving. what happens now? >> we're disappointed, obviously, in that. you know, sometimes these things take a long time. i mean, you can't, i mean, mafrty lipton will say, we're here for a week thing. we just want a fast pay hook. that's not true. we were in forest for 3.5 years and that sometimes it's long, sometimes it's six, seven years. i do believe there is great synergy between dollar general and family dollar. i think dollar general management is lacking. it's obviously somewhat disappointing you have a very good ceo at dollar general that's leaving. and that might throw a bit of a monkey wrench into a merger or a takeover there. >> does it impact you holding the stock? >> we don't really talk about

stocks we own and don't own. i mean, we own, if we own them and especially where we have a 13 day out, my lawyers would quill me if i start talking about what we're going to do with that stock. i would tell you this, i think it's very good long term and it's a good long-term potential, not with the management. i've said the publicly. not with the management that you have or with the board that you have. >> you are still considering the options that are out there regarding family dollar and what you think is best given the change of leadership at dollar general? yes. >> that's fair to say? >> yes. we look, always look at strategies and options, but i would tell you that i do think and i've said it that family dollar is in a good area. it's in a good area with a bad management around with a bad, you know, i've said it publicly, that the ceo shouldn't be the ceo and i don't mind saying it. a lot of people do mind saying

it. guys, you know, everybody, people really want to be liked. so do i, but somehow i talk and some people don't like me. what could i do? i feel sad about it. >> let me ask you, you're an outspoken guy and you have been pretty outspain lately in your nervous inside, if you will, about how you feel about the stockmarket, where we are right now. stan drunkenmiller was on this very stage earlier today. he raised the issue of the fed that the fed has put too much punch in the punch bowl for far too long and we're going to pay a price, potentially, down the road, that the risks have only increased, that the fed is growing more and more behind the curve. what is your thought as you sit here and you hear what stan truckenmiller said. the fed is behind the curve and they're getting more behind the curve the longer it stays.

as a result, the risks are increasing? >> you know, my son says this, he doesn't give me much credit most of the time. but he says, are you a master at being a reductionist. meaning you see a lot of material and then you pinpoint something that's important and that somehow goes click in your brain and it matters. now, i'll read you something, i wrote it down because i figured you would ask me and i have no memory. so i will read it. >> all right. >> janet yellin when she talked about monetary policy somewhere along the way, she said, monetary policy engines the effect on financial vulnerabilities, you know, such as excessive leverage, et set remarks et cetera, she means derivatives, i'm concerned about the derivatives, i always have been, warren buffet called those weapons of mass destruction, but we still have them. >> yep. >> that's because you have the cycle we're in and she says, so she says, the effect on the financial vulnerabilities the

monetary policy, such as stuff like that, are not understood. now she's saying they're not understood. don't you worry a little bit when, i mean, i think bernacki was great. i think the fed did a great thing in saving this country and they did. who got us into it? wall street got us into it. let not pull punches. wall street got us into the mess. they pulled us out. why they kept some of the management on wall street, i sure wouldn't have. if i had been the secretary of treasury, you woompb see the same management in some of these investment banks. some are very good again. some aren't. being that said, if she is saying that, then it's not an architect. right? you have to worry about the excessive printing of money and because you don't know. it's like having a patient. you know, and the patient is there and maybe getting better, but you keep giving him this medicine and you say to the doctors, well, what is that medicine going to do? maybe it's steroids of some type. he says, we really don't know

what it's going to do. but it seems to be making him better and happier, we keep giving it to him. what if he blows up and dies, we really don't know. that's really what she's saying. we keep doing this. i really think that it's artificial water going on and what we should be doing and i give back to the old saw is worrying about our productivity and worrying about who runs these great industries that we have and who are the ceos that we entrust them to. if you look at many of the companies i'm in when i went into them and are in now. i'm just talking about, i don't mean to pick on one or another. it's easier because i'm in it. if you inherited family dollar and your uncle gave it to you. you would keep that ceo for three days. everybody would say that. you wouldn't keep him. he's not a bad guy. i met with him. i had dinner with him. nice guy. i'm saying, that's what we should be doing. we should be worrying about who runs our companies, rather than

keep printing money. hey, if you keep printing our money and don't get pe going on this and you keep giving guys money at 3 or 4%, even an idiot can take that 3% money in a company at a gross margin of 8 or 9%, sy saying, geeze, look how goodpy earnings are. until one day all that money they're borrowing on a variable rare. one day it goips and up, who is to say you don't have inflation already, especially these guys aren't going to be able to meet that challenge and that is what i'm saying. >> are you being more selective as a result in the kind of stocks you are buying a tornadoes kind of companies you are being involved with now because of your concern? >> i have to tell you this, that iep, i've said it before. it's public irks has a great record, which proves, which proves, it's one of the reasons i talk about it, it proves that activism works. but here's my point to you, that

if you bought that stock for 2,000, just to prove the activism, you are up about annualized, you just as opposed to putting it in the bank. if you bought the hedge fund index at the same moment in time. over those periods of time annualize you'd be up about 22% annually. hedge fund index 4%. okay. over the last five years it's even better. you'd be up 36% annualized t. beauty of what i'm saying and through and out we have been extremely hedged. if i didn't have the hedge on. if i didn't have the shorts on, we'd be up instead of the 22% close to the 38 or 40. we were long only. okay. that proves this works. but it also proves how nervous i am about the market and i try to keep -- but it's never going to be fully hedged, but at iep i try to keep a major hedge on, because i am very nervous and i think one day and you don't know when and i really mean this, it

could be ten years, it could be ten days, i worry about the fact that what janet yellin says. i'm reducing it. if she doesn't know what the effects are. how the hell do i know. how does anybody out here know? how does any analyst know? yet, we keep doing it. the economy doesn't seem to be doing all that great. look at the guys you have running the companies in the economy. so can you go on and on with that. >> let me ask you about one stock, in particular that, we haven't spoken about all that recently, that i haven't heard you speak on publicly in quite a while. that's herbal life. there is a lot going on around herbal life. things have sort of died down behind the scenes in investigations at various corners of this country. are you still in herbal life? you still believe in that story? >> let me sort of cut it short a little bit. i'm not on the board. we have representatives on the board and i have a

confidentiality. so i can't really talk about herbal life. not because i'm trying to hide anything but because we're in a buying period anyway because earnings are coming out. it's the worst time for me to talk about herbal life. i just can't talk about it. i will say one thing that we bought and i'm proud of it. we bought 17 million shares at an average of 37 and we haven't sold one share. now that's all i can say and i think we have to drop it there. >> okay. but you know who is on the other side of that, of course. we have been down that road. >> i might have bought it from him. >> yeah. i wonder what he thinks about sort of where we are now. why don't we cc him in billin a ackm ackman, ladies and gentlemen [ applause ] >> bill ackman of pershing square. of course, we have a couple

things we had made up for this event. eb, obviously, knows what happened about 18 months ago live on cnbc, which was quite a moment for everybody involved. so we decided to have a couple of shirts made up. one for each of you. bill and carl reunited and on the back it feels so good with delivering alpha the logo. bill, i will present with you one. and carl, one for you as well. [ applause ] >> i hope it's extra large? >> extra large. >> yes. >> no offense. >> yeah. >> thanks for coming. >> sure. >> how in the world did this lap? how are you guys reunited on this stage after what happened on live television nearly 18 months ago in. >> look, what i would say is i respect carl's story. all right. he talks about actually he talked about it in our interview, i had a huge head start with carl in terms of my, i grew up in an affluent

community. i went to great public schools, i got a great education. carl got a little rougher start. >> a little tougher. >> a little tougher start. and he's done incredibly well over that period of time. you have to respect that record. we had a business disspute. it took eight years to work it out. carl is as persistent as i was. i was a little annoyed with him. again, you sold this to me 15 minutes to respond to camp. i'll call you in your office, you surprised me with carl. so it's my turn to surprise carl, i guess, today. but, look, he was actually thoughtful and supportive of what we're working on with valeant on the allergan situation. i thought big of him. >> that changed the way you thought? >> i called him and thanked him. his assistant picked up. he wasn't in the office. i said, "tell carl i'm calling to forgive him." a true story. and she said, oh, i think he'll really like that. okay. so he called me later that

afternoon and we chatted for 45 minutes and, you know, what we talked about, we moved beyond herbal life in about 30 seconds and i've listened to carl's interview, but where we share a lot of commonality is the importance of the shareholders' ability to have a voice in way a business is being managed. >> it's funny, you know, i was thinking about how we were going to have this conversation and in contrasting your styles as to whether, carl, this was activism, old school, new school, or if the irony of the whole thing here is that you guys are from the same school when it comes to activism and what you're trying to accomplish. is that strue, carl? would you say that? >> yeah, i do. i think. and that's one of the reasons i do respect bill. you know, i was thinking about it before bill called. i said, you know, it's almost

crazy that we're at these loggerheads, because i've heard you say different things by different companies and you are one of the few guys that really does speak out and says, if you don't like a guy. there aren't too many that do that. i respect what he said here and there. what the hell am i fighting so much for in then you called. i said, hey, great. i called him back and said it's blessed to forgive. that's how we left it. that was pretty much it. so what bill, you know, i guess asks you to be a little retrospective. before you wanted to be an activist investor when you were probably thinking of being a hedge fujd manager. you must have known about carl. are this things you have seen over the years or have respect in his style of what he's done, have learned from? how to deal with companies how to go into adversarial activists and come out on the other surprise. >> i think we have a different approach.

what we say about carl, i respect his point. to his point, there are a lot of people not prepared to stand their ground, speak their opinion, say some things that might be uncomfortedable for another people to hear. you know, it's important. and in a world, if you think about the capital markets, 100 years ago, andrew carnegie, j.p. morgan, these guys would own 20% of u.s. steel and if the ceo wasn't doing a good job. you know the owner would step in, replace the ceo, replace the board and what happened over 100 years is andrew carnegie's heirs, he didn't have heirs, he gave his money away t. vast majority of capital today is passively managed, extremely passively, if you think of an etf. who really owns an etf? it's a trading game. index funds tracking indevenlgs and have you this huge separation between the people who put up the capital and the people making decisions at the corporate level. >> and that distance creates the

risk. look at japan, i think the inefficiencies in the japanese economy the 20-year recession worst recession, they're trying to dig themselves out of. i think a lot has to do with the johning structure around cross ownership and the inability for the owners to have a voice. you think of carl icahn 1.0 i watched in the many '80s when i was if college, what happens was it was really mike milkin that gave capital entrepreneurial ij advis investors, that model, carl, was more about him. it was helpful to the other shareholders if a catalyze change. sometimes carl walked away with a profit when he got bought out. what happened with carl icahn 2.w0 and i think we like about activism when i went into the business, the only way carl is successful is if all the other

shareholders benefit along with him. and carl is not going to be successful if the other shareholders, carl owns 9% of whatever company or 5% or 6%, family dollar, also he has the support of the other shareholders, he will not succeed. i think a system in a world with past metrics is one with a few entrepreneurial investors prepare to say what they think and oppose the change in management and cost structure, capital structure. it's just off. it's floeth a trial balloon. you know, carl's trial balloons are bigger than other's trial balloons. they're louder when they pop. but the point i would make is he needs the backing of the institution of the retail investors in order to succeed. if he doesn't get it. now, without carl, there is no proposal. i may agree or dissay gragree ws ideas. we were able to convince the shareholders to be specific to support our new management team. if we were unsuccessful, you know, we would have to go home

and so it's a strategy where i think there is very little downside because, again the public, the major shareholders have to support the activists, otherwise, the activists fails. >> carl, what would you add to that? >> i think on a more general level, there is a real problem in our economy related to what bill just talked about. and he made a point just now about andrew carnegie. so carnegie, if he had a company and the ceo wasn't doing well, it would take two days, he'd get rid of him. today you have ceos you can't get rid of. what does that mean? who is going to suffer by this? the people are going to suffer is the middle class guy or the lower middle class guy. i will tell you why. the archie bunkers of the world. i think they still have a pension fund. most of these pension funds are not run well. you think they are run well. they're not.

if you read what daleo said on the pension funds, i read it the other day maybe. if you look at the numbers, that they're saying it's something that's sort of horrendous. i don't want to quote. i think i read it a while back. it's my reductionist thing. if you look at this, you look ahead ten years or 20 years, these companies pension funds will go brucht. they can't make it owe -- bankrupt. they can't make it. they're only making a 4% turn in these markets. these markets are real good. so the poor guy in the middle class, low middle class that believes he has a pension funds doesn't really have one. maybe. if they go broke, then you have to rely on the government to bail out the pension plan, if you look at the makeup demographically, will you have, i believe, a construct of washington where they're not necessarily going to care about bailing out these guys. you know, now people are voting and you look 20 years from now, those that are voting and

electing the senators and the congressmen have to decide to bail them out aren't going to want to bail them out. so we got a real problem and we're not doing anything about it. bill made a good point, too, have you these etfs index funds, maybe they'll give lip service to the fact that they really care about how these companies are run. basically, they're buying the index. they're just buying the s&p that goes up and down, that's why it's a little better today with a mutual fund. but what you really have today are very med yoerk managements in many companies and that is your real problem. i got, i was reading the "wall street journal" over the weekend on a book review and it was interesting. bill gates said in that book review and he said, he asked warren buffet what was the best business book he ever red? and he said it was the name of it was, i wrote it down.

because i tell you, i can't remember these. but it's a book that i, myself, that i, myself, read years ago in the '60s and it was by john brooks. a guy named john brooks. some people heard of him some didn't. but there was one thing in the book it was a really interesting and i remembered from years and years back from the '60s. but it's still true today and, you know, it may be said a different way. anyway, gates says r said it was the best book he's ever read. it's business inventions by john brooks. he said something like this. but it's hard, i'm taking it out of context. anyway, it doesn't matter if you have a perfect product and if you have great production. i'm paraphrasing. i can't read my hand warrick and if you have great marketing. but what you need is the right people to run and lead your company and that says it all. you need the right person to run

a company. you don't need the board to run the company. in fact, it's a neg tiver. the board listen, i'm on all these boards. i hate going to board meetings. and i try to put gates on t. board meetings, are live, for the most part and again there are some good boards, but it's satellite live. each guy comes up with a little idea. this idea, that idea. and to di greg i'll tell you sort of a funny story. i don't know if i can use curse words. >> don't use curse words. >> i won't. >> use a dash. >> if i request help it. so we hood this. >> we actually have carl on a three or four second delay. i was watching the tv in the back to make sure. leave them out, exactly. >> you can believe that. >> the live audience gets to hear it. >> okay him so, with this sort of says it all. this says it all. bliept out. you don't want that. bleep it out. you i don't know e don't want that. i don't want to take too much

time. this says it all what i believe. i don't believe in micromanaging. i believe that the board should stay the [ bleep ] out of it for the most part, unless are you a nobel prize winner in a biotech company or unless you really are extremely knowledgeable in the food company or something like that. what you want is the board to hold accountable. so one day, i have a board, iep, we're going back quite a while. maybe ten years or something. so we had stratosphere casino, we bought out of bankruptcy. the board is there, one of the members of the board i'm friendly with, on my board. sort of a powerful guys, he moves stuff out. he says, i got this great ychld everybody has a great idea for a casino. we have this room, a room like this side, we'll make night the copacabana. i says, it sounds like a great idea. hey, two old guys, the copacabana used to be fun. we have themty space. i says, okay. he gets the architects.

they're working on the plan. now board on a ceo a tough meat and potatos guy. that's what the stratosphere needed. it went bankruptcy, they were spending too much money, trying to be what they're not. i got this meat and potatos guys, dog great job, cutting the stuff out and making us money. i said, we want to come up and see you, we have an idea. okay, mr. icahn. he says, you know, a down to earth guy and my buddy, the board comes with the plans of these two architects all dressed up real nice and he comes out. we put this plan out. we're all smiling, look at this great idea. enrich me. i'm looking, wait a minute. hold everything. rich i promised you when i brought you in, from another casino, i'm not going to micromanage especially when you are doing so well. so tell me the truth. what do you think of the idea? everybody is staring at him. he says dumbest f-idea i ever

heard. he says, and i reached over and i tore up the plan. and that's how you should run a company. let the ceo run it. don't interfere with him unless he's doing badly or, obviously, unless you got secular changes coming on. when you have secular change, when you have major things that you have to do or raise capital, that's what we do we raise capital. >> carl, there is a time, though, when the board needs to get involved. >> i know you disagree with this a little bit. >> no, no, no, i 100% agree with what you are saying, into ind the right guy, let him run the company. i never called hunter for canadian pacific. if david reinhart needs me i'm available. there is a time, i'm 100% a company makes an acquisition off at a 50% premium. >> exactly. i just said that, when you are going, yeah, if one of my guys

wants to make an acquisition and he's a ceo without us saying okay. but that's different. that's not really operating. it fits in, but we have to fit in financially. we're the financial -- look, i will say this, there is nobody better at finance than us. i mean, guys here that made all this money. we're going to tell them, hey, how do you borrow the money? do you do it? how do you look ten years away? there is a secular change coming in? that's where we come in. you don't tell them thousand build the factory. build it here, build it there or build it at all. we say go do it. you just gave the guy $250 million. we'll get you the 250. we think you need it. >> bill, you alluded to this a bit ago. you may be after the same things, but your styles are different. and you as well had faced criticism about your style of activism. i know your not that fond of some of the things that marty lipton has said about activism. maybe he said them specifically

about you. he has certainly said things ability carl. water yowhat's your response to all of that? your style, how activism is? >> water interesting is for the first seven, eight years, marty lipton was incredibly supportive of what we do. i don't know why he's changed or whether he's changed. but what i would say is there is not a shareholder that i'm aware of that is critical of, again, marty lipton is not an investor in any of these companies. he runs a legal firm. they give advice to management teams that try to protect themselves from people like me and carl. so he's got a franchise. he's marketing. he's become the spokesperson for a legal defense practices. you call marty when carl shows up. i think marty should be sending royalty checks to carl. and maybe i deserve a few also. but the, look, i think what matters is the companies we've

taken stakes in over time, again, there are going to be exceptions, j.c. penney being a glaring example. our batting average is 27 for 30. target, borders, j.c. penney, target, our advice was get out of the credit card business. the ceo lost his job because of a thing they retained instead of exit. putting that aside, three retail disappointments. in the other cases, we paid eight fortune not while we own the stock, even after we exited. i think the best test of an activist is not how the stock does while they own it. we exited general growth, it's 140 full return, stock is up 10%. 15% since we sold it a few months ago. we want the businesses we own to thrive after we exit. i think that's a very good example. again, we're not successful without the support of the institutions. when i mentioned index funds before, i wasn't critical. i think they're an ideal

product. a great way deal cost effectively. the thing is if it's known as an index fund, he will put forth a proposal. in fact, very few people, if anything, had big institutions. when you talk to the big sturks for example allergan, we won't say anything publicly. we manage a lot of 401k money. if we arer with speefding to activists, we will lose.t. reason why activists aren't entrepreneurs is carl doesn't have to report to anyone. he can say what he thinks. we're a private business. we can speak truth without fear of losing a 401 k account. >> just to add to that. if you look at iups, to prove the point, to really prove it, i'll take a few of the companies as well as we've done in the

market at buying stocks and maybe selling them or getting them taken over. so back if 2000, we went out and bought four little oil companies that were terribly run, put them together. six years later, those oil companies, we put if two, 300 million. iup was in it all. we sold for a million five and it wouldn't have been done, the risks, we weren't there. the casinos, another example. we bought them. fixed them up. and did it with management and we're not managers. i want to be the first to say that. so i think, you know, in little greater talk the hedge fund guy, someone is coming in and saying, oh, we're going to go tell them what to do. we're going to help them. there may be cases where that's an exception. i don't really buy it. i boo i the fact that what you do is bring in a top gun in that area and let him do it and we've done it many, many times. and we brought in guys in all

these companies, we have been really good. look at chesapeake. there is a perfect example, chesapeake, they said to us, oh, it's a mistake. you can't really. and we liked -- he had dinner with me three or four times at my apartment. but he wasn't the guy for a lot of reasons, i won't go bad on aubrey. he said, you can't change the culture, you will fail. his stock was 15, 16, 17. we brought in this guy, a great guy, we don't tell him what to do. he went in. he's cleaned it up. the stock is up from 15 to 30. the oil market hasn't changed that much. it's just put in the right person to run it. >> that is a simple answer. and that's what we have to do for our society, by the way. >> before we go, bill, news today, more of it, on the aforementioned allergan, you wrote a new letter telling them, stop delaying this special meeting. what's going to happen? is the deal going to happen?

john paulsen was on this stage today. hooacy share holdner allergan, he said the best thing is for that deal to happen. >> i have written very few critical letters of board of directors, maybe three in ten years in the history of the firm. water going on at allergan i think is unprecedented for a company with a $50 billion market track. which they've made a 50% premium offer for the business t. shareholders are clearly interested at a minimum negotiating or learning more about this offer. the board has refused to have a meeting with valeant. you can say fine the responds to did bass to attack valeant. call eight house of cards, accuse it of of fraud without basis, so, you know, my understanding of the market. if i went public and said, this company is an accounting fraud, this company is, you know, organic growth numbers they're putting out is false, i didn't

have a factual basis for that to prove these allegation, the fcc would be all over that. you have a 50 billion mark cap. 50 million shareholders, t. rowe surprise a major shareholder of allergan and valeant. the board of this company is attacking the valeant currency as a way to defend the company. i think it's completely inappropriate,b possibly illegal. what they should do, water unusual about allergan, which is very dangerous is they put in place bylaws. the shareholders pushed for a special meeting provision. special meeting provision is important. because if a deal comes along and there is no ability and the board won't respond and puts in place a poison pill, the board can't do nothing until the next annual meeting a year away. they asked for a special provision. it was put in place. what did aller gan do, they said, we feed a 25% vote.

we put in a pill of 10%. in order to get the 25%, we require to you solicit all of our shareholders, which will take you a couple months, by the way, we are only going to allow you to hold the meeting not within 90 days of the anniversary of the annual meeting, you can delay for 120 days. you have to fill out a whole long length of documents in order to submit proechlts can you only call one a year. you can only call it between october and february. all right. well, what are they afraid of? valeant made an offer to acquire the company. they said, look, with rewilling to 5i a little more, to negotiate a deal if the board comes to the table now. it's a deal that 44% of the combined company can be owned by allergan, they don't analyze valeant. instead, what they've done is attack the companies. the good fuse is shareholders are supportive. 90% of the stock exchanged

hands. many of the investors don't think the stock is worth what they're trading today unless the deal hams. ultimately, i think the transaction happens t. right thing for the board to do, sit down with valeant. ask if they have questions about accounting. meet with valeant's auditors. ask the cfo questions. ask for support for the organic growth numbers. if they have any doubt about that business, that i should do due diligence. >> we will make that the last story. except one thing, this herbal life story who is going to win? >> it's not about winning. it's a good place to ends. ist not about winning. i would like to find a way to get carl out of this stock. he can get out at a very nice profit. i'd like him to walk away with a profit and that would be a great outcome for carl and that would be wonderful for us. and so, you know, carl, maybe we

should have a conversation. >> maybe we will. >> well, i can speak on behalf of everybody here, this has been wonderful. guys, thank you so much. [ applause ] . >> bill ackman and article icahn, of course. >> thank you. >> thank you, sir. >> hey, good seeing you. >> okay. coming up next, "fast money" live from the cnbc institutional investor delivering alpha conference in new york city. we have been listening to legendary investor bill icahn and bill ackman the surprise gefrt, he surprised icahn. two comments made by akunne anding aman, we are awaiting president obama to deliver some remarks on ukraine and foreign policy from the white house briefing room. as soon as we do see president obama take that podium. we will go to him line we are taking this for a reason. >> it's important. we start to get word that the eu was going to lean for a direct landing against russia. there is not, as much as this

seems the u.s. is acting alone, the u.s. is the only one that can put teeth into russia. my core view here is that it will be very difficult for europe to follow through and apply pressure when, in fact, they're getting 25% of their guests. there are a lot of strategic partnerships. what's coming out today on the u.s. side is ultimately going after four or five companies, nova tech and basically saying no new capital lent beyond three months. i think this is also kind of a really soft attempt. i don't think this is terribly aggressive. i don't think this is going to be particularly eblgive. having said that. they clearly are do whack they can to try to not hurt u.s. interests, not hurt u.s. investors. nova tech has been one of the best investments in russian stockmarkets for four or five years. it's a great company. i don't think nova tech will go down ten points tomorrow. having said that, emerging markets are at 16 month highs.

the russian market is struggling underneath this. >> are we seeing evidence of s&p and rubys based on this? what are you looking for in after hours? >> i would say germany, tim mentioned russia is a big trading partner. you shut down access here in the u.s. what does that mean? >> the president is taking the podium. let's listen in. >> i want to talk about thing as we are take income support of ukraine. before i do, i want to take a few minutes to up update the american people that i addressed to secretary kerry this afternoon. first of all, i thanked secretary kerry and our outstanding military leaders in afghanistan for their success in helping to break the impact of the presidential election there. thanks, to their efforts and thanks to the afghans and the courage of the two candidates, both of whom i spoke to last week. the candidates have agreed to abide by the results of a comprehensive and

internationally supervised audit that will review all the ballots a to form a unity government. if they keep their commitment, afghanistan will witness the first democratic transfer of power from the history of that nation. the progress will honor both candidates who have put the interests of a united afghanistan first. the millions of afghan was defied threats in order to vote and the service of our troops and civilians who have sacrificed so much. this progress reminds us that even as our combat mission in afghanistan ends this year, america's commitment to a sovereign, united and democratic afghanistan will endure, along with our determination that americans are never again threatened by terrorists pence of afghanistan. second, theyup dated be on the goelgs of iran over the nuclear program. under the last six months, iran has met, halting the progress of

its nuclear program, allowing more inspections and rolling back its most dangerous stockpile of nuclear material. meanwhile, we are working with our p 5 plus 1 partners to reach a comprehensive agreement that assures us iran's program will, in fact, be peaceful and they they won't obtain nuclear weapon. based on conversations with secretary kerry and my national security team, we have a credible way forward but as we approach a dead lean of judgment 20th under the interim deal, there is still some significant gaps between the international community and iran and we have more work to do. so for the next few days, we'll continue consulting with congress and our team will continue discussions with iran and our partners as we determine whether additional time is necessary to extend our negotiations. third, we continue to support diplomatic efforts to end the violence between israel and

hamas. as i've said repeatedly, israel has a right to defend itself from rocket attacks that terrorize the israeli people. there is no country on earth that can be expected to live under a daily barrage of rockets. and i'm proud that the iron dome system that americans helped israel develop and fund has saved many israeli lives. but over the past two weeks, we have all been heart broken by the violence, especially the death and injury of so many innocent civilians in gaza, men, women and children can caught in the cross fire. that's why we have been working with our partners in the region to have a cease-fire to protect civilians on both sides. yesterday, israel did agree to a cease-fire. unfortunately, hamas continued to fire rockets at civilians, there prolonging the conflict. but the israeli people and the palestinian people don't want to

live like this. they deserve to live in peace and security free from fear. that's why we're going to continue to endournlg u courage diplomatic efforts to restore the cease-fire and we continue egypt's cease-fire to bring this about. over the next 24 hours, we will continue to stay in close contact with our friends and parties in the region and we will use all of our diplomatic efforts to support efforts of closing a deal on a cease-fire. in the meantime, we're going to continue to stress the need to protect civilians in gaza and in israel and to avoid further escalation. finally, given it's continued provocations in ukraine, today i have approved a new set of sanctions on some of russia's largest companies and financial institutions. along with our iallies, with whom i have been coordinating closely the last several days and weeks, i repeatedly made it clear russia must halt the flow

of weapons across the border into ukraine. russia must urge separatists to release their hostages and support a sfooes cease-fire, russia needs to pursue internationally mediated talks and agree to meeting monitors on the border. i've made this clear wage to mr. putin. many of our european partners have made this clear wage to mr. putin. we have emphasized our preference to resolve this issue diplomatically, but we have to see concrete actions and not just words that russia, in fact, is committed to you trying to end this conflict along the russia-ukraine border. so far, russia has failed to take any of the steps that i mentioned. in fact, russia's support for the separatists and violations of ukraine's sovereignty has continued. on top of the sanction we have already ill posed, we are, therefore, dessic nateing sectors of the russian economy as eligible for sanctions.

we are freezing the assets of several defense companies and we are blocking few financing of some of russia's most important banks and energy companies. these sanctions are significant. but they are also targeted, designed to have the maximum impact on russia while limiting any spillover effects on american companies or those of our ii allies. we are taking these actions in close consultation with our ilice. we are meeting in brussels to agree on their next steps. meanwhile we will continue to stand with the ukrainian people as they seek to determine their own future. even in the mid rs of this cries, they have made remarkable progress these fast pew months, they elected a new president. they're pursueing important reforms. they signed a new agreement with

the european union and the united states will continue to offer our strong support to ukraine to help stabilize its economy and defend its territorial integrity. because like any people the ukrainians deserve the right to forge their own destiny. in closing, i'll point out the obvious. we live in a complex world and at a challenging time. none of these challenges lend themselves to quick or easy solution, but all of them require the american leadership and as commander-in-chief, i am confident that if we stay patient and determined, that we will, in africa, meet these challenges. thanks very much. . >> and we have been listening to president obama make a statement on foreign policy, a wide ranging statement on israel. what we are focusing on here is expanding if sanctions against russia. the president is making it explicitly clear that they will be targeting the sanctions, including limiting the financing, i should say of banks

as well as energy companies, but that won't affect american companies or the companies of our allies. tim, what's the take-away here? >> again, i think the limit to what we can do here. these are all very important companies in the russian context. their ability to access capital beyond three months outside of the united states is very high. their local fixed income markets are very high. i think it's important for the president and the e.u. to continue to send a message that destabilizing events and actings as if they are not are things that just cannot happen. i commend the president for going down this road. these are not going to stop in this way. >> for smart contacts on this, let's check in with eamon javers. >> we will talk about the companies sanctioned in this move by the white house today. interestingly, on gas prom, it's

gazprom bank, a lot of names is rose net oil companies. so, obviously, some huge entities here, but not gazprom, itself, gazprom, bank, being sanged. some interesting individuals here on this list as well. starting, they've got about five different individuals here worn sanctioned by name, starting with sergei basida, he's the commander the white house says of the fifth service of the ssb. >> that is the success or to the kgb. i have not seen the united states sanction a former kgb or fsb officer before. maybe it's been done. it is certainly a strong step diplomatically here. whether or not it has the practical effect you are talking about in terms of the economic operations of these countries, these companies in these countries, that remains to be seen. >> eamon javers, thanks, for that. it's a little noisy here. we are delivering alpha conference here in new york city. we will trade some of the highlights of this conference right after this break

. the delivering alpha conference.

we just heard article icahn and bill ackman. what's your take away from that

conversation? >> one thing ackman talked about how difficult allergan board is and to call a meeting. it wouldn't shock me to see icahn become a shareholder. obviously, with that much money, he would be a big shareholder, maybe help bill along in his solicitation to call a separate meeting. >> that would be nice. >> john paulsen is an allergan shareholder. we said he sees that being a significant upside from there. >> that does it for us here at "fast money" from the delivering alpha conference. "mad money" is up next.

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or if light could seek out the dark? what would happen if that happens? anything. my mission is simple -- to make you money. i'm here to level the playing field for all investors. there's always a bull market somewhere. i promise to help you find it. "mad money" starts now. hey, i'm cramer. welcome to "mad money." welcome to cramerica. other people want to make friends. i'm trying to make you money. my job isn't just to entertain but to teach you. call me at 1-800-743-cnbc. or tweet me @jim cramer.