Icahn Investor Group Boosts Stake in USX

A group led by investor Carl C. Icahn increased its stake in USX Corp. to 13.06% this week from 11.4%, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission Thursday.

Icahn said his group had bought 4,250,100 shares of USX common stock for $155.2 million as of Wednesday, and said the group might seek more shares.

Rumors that Icahn was increasing his stake drove the company’s stock price up sharply on heavy trading this week, to $38.75 on Wednesday from $33.125 at last week’s close.

USX stock closed down slightly Thursday, off 37.5 cents to close at $38.375 on heavy volume of 4 million shares, making it the second most active issue on the New York Stock Exchange.

Icahn could not be reached for comment, and his lawyer declined to elaborate on the filing.

Analysts speculated that Icahn increased his stake to express unhappiness with the company’s decision, announced Tuesday, to sell off oil and gas reserves of its Texas Oil & Gas Corp. unit, which USX bought in 1986 for $3 billion.

In the filing, Icahn said the group was unhappy with the stock’s price, and intended to urge management to explore “meaningful restructuring that would substantially enhance shareholder value.”

That might include selling off more assets or aggressive stock repurchases, analysts said. The company has said it is selling off its Texas Oil reserves to raise cash to pay down debt and buy back stock.

The filing also said Icahn’s group would consider studying a possible deal for the company, or soliciting proxies to nominate a director to the USX board.

But analysts doubted that Icahn would pursue a serious takeover bid for the Pittsburgh-based steel and energy giant.

“His intentions appear to have been obvious for quite a period of time, and that is to maximize his investment,” said one analyst. “He sees some opportunity for that to happen by increasing his stake.”

The filing said Icahn’s group holds 33,599,900 shares of USX common stock.