Gary Cohn, the former economic adviser to U.S. President Donald Trump, has teamed up with investor Clifton S. Robbins to seek US$600 million in an initial public offering for a new blank-check acquisition company, filings showed on Tuesday.
Cohn is the latest high-profile name to join the frenzy of Wall Street dealmaking related to special purpose acquisition companies .SPACs were considered a banking backwater a decade ago but have emerged in 2020 as one of the most active areas on Wall Street, driven by splashy deals for the likes of space tourism company Virgin Galactic Holdings Inc and fantasy sports and gambling company DraftKings Inc.
A SPAC is a shell company that raises money through an IPO to buy an unspecified operating company to then take public, usually within two years. Cohn had been in talks with Robbins for the past month or so about joining the SPAC, according to a person familiar with the matter.