Paper products
The company acquired MeadWestvaco's paper business for $2.3B in 2005 and renamed it NewPage. Cerberus also purchased, from Georgia Pacific Corporation, its Distribution Division/Building Products and all of its associated real estate. It renamed this new company BlueLinx Holdings, based in Atlanta.
Government services (military, energy, and food & drug)
Cerberus owns IAP Worldwide Services, which bought Johnson Controls' World Services division in February 2005. Previously owned Multimax (purchased predecessor company in 2000 and Multimax in 2006; sold entire holding in 2007 to Harris Corporation). Cerberus owns Tier 1 Group, a private company that provides military training.
Retail
Cerberus purchased 655 of the 2,500 Albertson's, Inc., grocery stores, forming Albertsons LLC of Boise, Idaho, in June 2006. It also had an ownership stake in the now-bankrupt Mervyn's department stores, which was acquired from Target Corp. In May 2012, Cerberus sold its holdings in Torex Retail Holdings, Ltd., a Dunstable, England-based provider of information technology systems for the retail, fuel and convenience stores and pub markets in the United Kingdom and Continental Europe that was acquired in June 2007, to MICROS Systems, Inc. In January 2013, it announced a deal to acquire 877 stores in the Albertson's, Acme, Shaw's and Star Market chains from SuperValu for $100 million and acquisition of $3.2 billion on SuperValu debt. In February 2014, it was reported that Safeway Inc was in advanced talks with private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management LP over a leveraged buyout deal. After integrating the Safeway purchase, on October 14, 2022 Kroger announced it would be acquiring Albertsons for $25 billion, combining the largest and second-largest supermarket chains in North America. The deal faced legal challenges and was never completed.
Financial services
Cerberus acquired 51% of GMAC, General Motors' finance arm, in 2006 for $7.4 billion. It appointed Ezra Merkin as nonexecutive Chairman.
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On December 10, 2008, GMAC said, "GMAC LLC, the auto and home lender seeking federal aid, hasn't obtained enough capital to become a bank holding company and may abandon the effort, casting new doubt on the firm's ability to survive. A $38 billion debt exchange by GMAC and its Residential Capital LLC mortgage unit to reduce the company's outstanding debt and raise capital hasn't attracted enough participation." GMAC's exposure to the gap in residual values was around $3.5 billion.
In December 2008, Cerberus subsequently informed GMAC's bondholders that the financial services company may have to file for bankruptcy if a bond-exchange plan is not approved. The company had previously said it may fail in its quest to become a bank holding company because it lacks adequate capital. In January 2009, Merkin resigned from his chairmanship as a condition by the U.S. government. Five days earlier, the Federal Reserve granted GMAC bank holding company status, so it could get access to the bailout money. On December 29, 2008, the U.S. Treasury gave GMAC $5 billion from its $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP). (On May 21, 2009, the US Treasury department announced it would invest an additional $7.5 billion in GMAC, and on December 30, 2009, the US Treasury department said that they would invest another $3.8 billion in GMAC because the company had been unable to raise additional funds in the private sector. This raised the total government investment in GMAC to $16.3 billion.)
Cerberus's investments in Chrysler and GMAC totaled about 7% of its assets under management. At the end of May 2009, Cerberus scaled back their ownership of GMAC as a condition of the lender becoming a bank-holding company, when the bulk of GM's existing ownership stake in GMAC was placed into a trust, overseen by a trustee appointed by the Treasury, to be gradually dispersed. Cerberus distributed the majority of its stake in GMAC to its investors. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) gave GMAC access to the Temporary Liquidity Guarantee Program that allows companies to borrow money at lower interest rates. The initiative was created in October 2008 to help banks borrow money by promising to repay investors if the banks defaulted. The U.S. Government also waived a rule that would restrict the amount of loans that GMAC could make to Chrysler's customers and dealers because both firms are owned in part by Cerberus Capital Management.
In December 2006, Cerberus acquired the Austrian bank BAWAG P.S.K. for a reported EUR3.2 billion. In August 2007, Cerberus announced that it was closing one of their mortgage companies, Aegis Mortgage. It owned half of a 9.9% share (5%) with the Gabriel Group in Bank Leumi, purchased in 2005, but as of April 19, 2009, it was decided to sell in order to boost capital. Cerberus also has a controlling interest in Japanese bank Aozora.
In Australia, Cerberus purchased Bluestone Mortgages (specialist mortgage lending and servicing) in 2018, Angle Finance (equipment finance) in 2019 and Westpac Group's Strategic Alliances (Vendor Finance) in 2020.
