Pierre Karl Péladeau has just signed one of the greatest financial towers in Quebec’s history.
While ordinary people looked at the fall in TVA Sports or ruminated the last cuts at TVA, a stock bomb went almost unnoticed: Quebec’s action smashed $ 41.52, reaching its summit for the last 52 weeks.
On June 23, 2025, the action closed at $ 41.45, which vibrated markets like never before.
Imagine. It was $ 30.63 on January 3. In six months, Québécor added $ 1.57 billion to its market capitalization. A relative gain of 20.5 %. A Miracle in Quebecoise.
A holder of 92 % of Quebecor’s shares, Péladeau alone pocketed a personal stock market gain estimated at $ 1.44 billion in the first six months of 2025.
Yes, you read that right. A billion and a half flew into the pockets of a single man.
And yet, just a few months ago, everything seemed to collapse. Pierre Karl Péladeau was the target of a popular contempt rarely seen.
And I have to include myself in there, I who was very hard towards PKP several times. Hockey30, journalists, unions, the artistic world: all demanded its head.
He had cut 547 positions at TVA. He had refused to close TVA Sports, which accumulates nearly $ 300 million in losses.
And how not to shiver indignation when we remember that in full media crisis, Pierre Karl Péladeau has paid a total remuneration of $ 20.4 million, including basic salary, bonuses, bonis and advantages linked to his multiple positions at Quebecor and Videotron.
Yes, 20 million, while nearly 600 VAT employees were thrown on the street.
The gap between PKP’s public speech, which cries for dismissals, and its internal practices barely grazed. How to justify such a concentration of personal wealth when VAT craftsmen saw their projects, their jobs or their future simply sacrificed?
I was among its most severe detractors. I denounced its moral and financial contradictions. I even described his empire as “inherited insolence”.
But we must recognize one thing: Pierre Karl Péladeau does not lead a prince’s life. His chalet is modest, far from the spectacular domains of the Desmarais or Luc Poirier family.
No flashy yachts, no Ferraris. The businessman, who is loved or hates, remains astonishing sobriety for someone in his stature. And that must be emphasized.
Above all, it is necessary today to lower and note this: Pierre Karl Péladeau won.
His most polarizing gesture, either to be dismissed massively, to slash in culture, to let TVA Sports die slowly, was interpreted by the markets as proof of lucidity.
A strong signal. He showed that he was able to eliminate his own media children to ensure the survival of the Empire.
Investors loved it. They don’t want TVA Sports survive. They want the hemorrhage to stop. And PKP promised to them that he was ready to close the station in the summer of 2026 if he could not keep the rights of NHL and CH at TVA Sports. He said it publicly.
The tragedy then becomes a recovery plan. The blood shed in TVA becomes a proof of courage. And the same analysts who, a year ago, predicted the bursting of the media group, today speak of “accelerated valuation”.
The truth is that Pierre Karl Péladeau has never been afraid to burn his reputation to save his fortune. He knows that the scholarship does not judge the honor, but on the figures. And the figures are extraordinary.
Its bet on the collapse of deficit content has worked. He saved in what was popular but expensive.
Artistic Quebec still cries up the disappearance of Witchthis literally strangled success tésérie for lack of budget.
A series that has just dominated the nominations to Gemini, but of which TVA refused to produce a final. For what ? Because it was necessary to inject millions into the bottomless well that is TVA. A total absurdity.
Worse still: to save, TVA Sports did not even submit candidates for Gemini 2025, missing the opportunity to be recognized in a gala dominated by its rivals … of which Canadian hockey to RDS and The Paris Olympic Games at Radio-Canada.
The decision is purely budgetary. We prefer to withdraw rather than pay. One more humiliation, which has given reason to those who demand the outright closure of the sports chain.
But his decisions, in the short term, convinced the scholarship that Quebec could become a real growth investment.
The scholarship spoke. She said:
“You can do it. You have proven that you can make unpopular, strategic, profitable decisions. »»
Barely a few months ago, Pierre Karl Péladeau was the favorite punching bag from media Quebec. The president of Quebecor was criticized for his disconnected lifestyle, his lifestyle as a prince, his business choices deemed nebulous, his personal expenses disguised as corporate costs.
The sinking was total. Hundreds of sacrificed journalists. Amputated bulletins. Ruin productions. And at the top of this ivory tower, PKP, always richer, always more untouchable. Critics were raining. And hockey30 at the head of the peloton. Yes, we have banged it. Strong. And often.
But the story has just turned. Because this same man, mocked, hated … has just delivered a lesson in brutal efficiency to the whole financial community. A real uppercut to its detractors.
This personal saga, woven with pride, betrayal and redemption, is larger than life. And today we have to admit: Péladeau has won. Not the hearts of Quebecers. But respect for the markets. And sometimes, in this brutal world … that’s all that matters.
Today, figures speak stronger than criticism. The shareholders who had Quebec in January made a fortune in six months.
Those who bet on the fall of PKP were crushed. And we even have to say it frankly: PKP has just marked the history of Quebec capitalism.
I have to admit it, even if it burns my fingers to write these words: Pierre Karl Péladeau gave me a lesson in “business” today …
