S&P- TSX Index factorQEC will benefit huge from being upgraded to this index today. What happened to HRG will have reverse effects on stcoks like QEC. Should be a great day, get your tickets.
High River blames low share price on index fund selling
2008-09-22 05:51 PT - News Release
Mr. Dan Hrushewsky reports
HIGH RIVER GOLD COMMENTS ON SHARE PRICE DECLINE
High River Gold Mines Ltd. would like to comment on the large share transaction volume and consequent share price decline resulting from trading late on Friday, Sept. 19, 2008. The company believes that the share price decline was related to High River's deletion from several Standard & Poor's/Toronto Stock Exchange indices, and the resulting selling by index funds.
On Sept. 12, 2008, Standard & Poor's Canadian index operations issued news in Stockwatch announcing its quarterly index changes. In this press release it was announced that High River, among others, was to be deleted from the S&P/TSX Composite, Global Gold, Global Mining, and SmallCap indices, effective as of market open on Sept. 22, 2008. To adjust for these index changes, index funds likely sold all of their remaining High River shareholdings late last Friday. Several brokerage analysts specializing in stock index trading estimated that these funds were required to sell approximately 15 million High River shares to realign their holdings with the announced changes. Over nine million High River shares, or nearly four times the average daily trading volume, traded during the last hour of trading on Friday, causing the share price to drop by more than 40 per cent.
The company is not aware of any other corporate developments to explain this share price decline on Sept. 19, 2008.
High River believes that its current share price significantly undervalues the company, and is currently examining various initiatives to remedy this situation.
We seek Safe Harbor.