corporate raider

American  

noun

1. a person who seizes control of a company, as by secretly buying stock and gathering proxies.

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corporate raider British  

noun

1. finance a person or organization that acquires a substantial holding of the shares of a company in order to take it over or to force its management to act in a desired way

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Etymology

Origin of corporate raider

First recorded in 1985–90

Example Sentences

“We’re old enough to remember the bitter episode four decades ago when another corporate raider, Saul Steinberg — who, as it so happens, was good friends with one of the current activists, Nelson Peltz — launched a hostile takeover attempt of Disney and threatened to break apart the company. He was defeated, much as these activists must be defeated today,” the letter said.

From Los Angeles Times

Someone said it had been built by the billionaire corporate raider Sir James Goldsmith in 1989.

From New York Times

It grew from a small, $30 million family business in West Texas to one of the largest after combining with corporate raider Boone Pickens' Mesa Energy in 1997 and later discovering the shale oil hidden below its acreage.

From Reuters

Four years later, Ann Romney toured Iowa and New Hampshire, offering “the other side of Mitt” — a caring, empathic family man who did not fit the caricature of the heartless corporate raider drawn by his rivals.

From New York Times

“The Grave Dancer” became a successful corporate raider, taking over radio stations, trailer parks, barges, wire and cable factories and garbage-fueled power plants.

From Los Angeles Times