Hedge Funder Pushes Procter & Gamble (PG) Stock Up 4%

Procter & Gamble (NYSE: PG) stock is making a rare one-day push today thanks to a sizable investment from a respected hedge funder.

Bill Ackman, who runs the hedge fund Pershing Square Capital Management, has taken a big stake in Procter & Gamble stock, according to The Wall Street Journal. The investment pushed the stock – which has encountered some hard times of late – up 4%.

Procter & Gamble stock hit a 10-month low last month after the company lowered its earnings guidance for the second quarter and the 2013 fiscal year. Competition from the likes of Unilever (NYSE: UL) and Colgate-Palmolive (NYSE: CL) have been eating into P&G’s usually steady sales, prompting a 5.6% drop-off in a matter of a week – a fast decline for a stock that is known as being a reliable safe haven.

Since then shares have recovered those losses, however, and PG is back trading as high as it was two months ago.

Ackman is reportedly investing in Procter & Gamble stock with the intent of making sweeping changes to the consumer-products giant. P&G management has said that it would be open to change.

Today investors are betting that whatever changes Ackman has in store will help this blue-chip company regain some of the market share it’s lost in recent years.