Pulte Family Takes an activist position in Buzzfeed

The Pulte Family has taken an activist position in BuzzFeed (BZFD), supporting the changes proposed by Vivek Ramaswamy, the firm said on Tuesday.

In a post on X, the founding family of PulteGroup Inc. said it is concerned about BuzzFeed’s trajectory and “the response from the flailing CEO Jonah Peretti.”

“In our opinion, the Current BuzzFeed CEO Jonah Peretti is driving the company into the ground, and when Vivek Ramaswamy gave him a life boat to save his sinking ship, Peretti told him thanks anyway,” claimed the firm.

They go on to argue that “CEO Peretti has delivered unacceptable financial and operational performance, quarter after quarter,” and that if he is unable to modernize BuzzFeed, he should bring in someone who is or he should buy the company back from its shareholders.

“We support the changes Vivek Ramaswamy has proposed and that which he thinks are necessary,” said William J. Pulte, CEO of Pulte Capital and a former Director of PulteGroup.

Pulte added: “For the avoidance of doubt, we are not working in concert with and are not working in a group with Mr. Ramaswamy. To that end, we did not inform Mr. Ramaswamy before we purchased shares in BuzzFeed.”

BuzzFeed shares spiked following the news on Tuesday. At the time of writing it is up over 7%, trading above the $3 per share mark. While the stock is still trading at significant lows, it has managed to rally around 200% this year.