Often, the parent company starts by selling a portion of the new company to the public, to establish a market and a following among investors. That way, by the time of the spin-off, stock in the new company may be liquid enough to be sold relatively easily, or retained with some confidence as a worthwhile investment.
In our experience, and in most academic studies of the subject, this helps the parent and its corporate spinoff. Both generally do better than comparable companies for at least several years after the spinoff takes place.
When a company carries out a spinoff, it sets up one of its subsidiaries or divisions as a separate company, then hands out shares in the new company to its own shareholders. It may hand out the shares as a special dividend, or give its shareholders an opportunity to swap shares of the parent company for the shares of the newly established spinoff.
Study after study has shown that after an initial adjustment period of a few months, stock spinoffs tend to outperform groups of comparable stocks for several years. (For that matter, the parent companies also tend to outperform comparable firms for several years after a spinoff.) The above-average performance of spinoffs makes sense for a couple of reasons.
First, company managers naturally prefer to acquire or expand their assets, not get rid of them. Getting rid of assets reduces a company’s total potential profit. The management of a parent company will only hand out a subsidiary to its own investors if it’s nearly certain that the subsidiary, and the parent, will be better off after the spinoff than before.
Second, spinoffs involve a lot of work and legal fees. Companies only have an incentive to do spinoffs under two sets of favourable conditions: When they feel it isn’t a good time to sell (which often means it’s a good time to buy); or, when they feel the assets they plan to spin off will be worth substantially more in the future, possibly within a few years.
Quite often, a big company will spin off a small subsidiary because it feels the subsidiary is a tiny gem, but that it’s too small to make an impact on the much larger financial statements and market capitalization of the parent.
At TSI Network we’ve had great success with a number of spun off stocks over the years. That’s especially true of the many spinoffs we have recommended that have gone up after they began trading, and have later attracted a takeover bid at a substantial premium over the market price.
Needless to say, things don’t always work out this well. Spinoffs and their parents do sometimes run into unforeseeable woes. But on the whole, in investing, spinoffs are the closest thing you can find to a sure thing.
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In response, Becton began a multi-year plan to streamline its operations. That included the April 2022 spinoff of its Diabetes Care business as embecta (see page 90). Investors received one share of embecta for every five common shares of Becton they held.
In early 2025, Becton announced a second spinoff—its Biosciences and Diagnostic Solutions operations. However, it ultimately opted to merge that business with a rival firm. That transaction will let the company pay down its debt and return more capital to shareholders.
On October 1, 2025, Fermi completed an initial public offering of 32.5 million common shares at $21.00 each. The company’s founders, including former Texas governor Rick Perry, continue to control most of the outstanding shares.
On September 10, 2025, Klarna completed an initial public offering of 34.3 million common shares at $40.00 a share. The stock jumped to over $57 a share on the first day but is now down 10% since the IPO.
Thanks to strong demand from the builders of new AI datacentres, Western Digital is up 145% since the split, while Sandisk has soared more than 300%.
Even so, both companies serve highly cyclical industries, which adds to their risk. As well, both firms make most of their products in China and other parts of Asia, which increases their exposure to U.S. tariffs.
Due to strong competition from lower-cost brands, Coty is now exploring the sale (or spinoff) of its mass color cosmetics portfolio, which includes brands such as CoverGirl, Rimmel, Sally Hansen and Max Factor. Those products have annual sales of $1.2 billion, or about 20% of Coty’s total sales. The company is also considering selling its Brazilian operations, which generate annuals sales of $400 million.
The company is now discussing a potential merger with rival US Foods Holding Co. (New York symbol USFD).
CINEPLEX INC. $12 is a hold. The company (Toronto symbol CGX; Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 63.4 million; Market cap: $760.8 million; Dividend suspended in March 2020; Takeover Target Rating: Medium; www.cineplex.com) is Canada’s largest operator of movie theatres with 155 locations (1,607 screens). It also operates 16 location-based entertainment venues in seven provinces.
On June 1, 2019, DowDuPont investors received one Corteva share for every three shares they held. Since the spinoff, Corteva’s shares have jumped 118%.
Corteva now plans to split its seeds and chemical operations into two separate, publicly traded firms.
The company now plans a second spinoff—its Orthopaedics business. Called DePuy Synthes, it makes hip, knee, and shoulder implants as well as surgical instruments. Its 2024 sales of $9.2 billion represented 10% of Johnson & Johnson’s total revenue. The company will probably complete the transaction in early 2027.