Six weeks after the talks first surfaced, MarcyPen Capital Partners — the investment firm backed by Shawn "JAY-Z" Carter — remains the leading contender in negotiations to acquire LVMH's 50 percent stake in Fenty Beauty, the cosmetics brand Rihanna launched with the French luxury conglomerate in 2017. No deal has closed as of this writing.
LVMH's stake is valued at roughly $1 billion, with the brand overall estimated between $1 billion and $2 billion — well below its $2.8 billion valuation from 2021. Fenty Beauty posted about $450 million in net sales in 2024. LVMH retained investment bank Evercore in October 2025 to explore a sale of the stake, and MarcyPen is evaluating financing structures, including discussions with outside investors, to fund the acquisition.
MarcyPen formed in 2024 through the merger of Marcy Venture Partners — the firm Carter co-founded in 2018 with Jay Brown and Larry Marcus — and Pendulum Opportunities, the investment arm of Pendulum Holdings. It manages approximately $1.1 billion in assets. Marcy Venture Partners historically took minority, growth-stage stakes, a pattern that shifted this year when MarcyPen participated in direct-to-consumer retailer Quince's $500 million Series E round — the kind of larger capital deployment a Fenty Beauty acquisition would extend. Marcy Venture Partners already has ties to Rihanna's business ecosystem, having backed her lingerie brand Savage X Fenty in funding rounds in 2019 and 2022. A completed deal would give MarcyPen co-ownership of Fenty Beauty alongside Rihanna's own 50 percent stake, making Carter a business partner in Rihanna's most commercially significant venture outside music.
The pursuit lands the same year Carter has leaned into a broader business expansion, following the "2026 is all offense" framing from his April GQ cover and a stretch that has included Reasonable Doubt's 30th-anniversary rollout and an eight-part HBO documentary series premiering this fall.
Source: Billionaires.Africa
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