Sedi reporting of Employee Savings Plan I researched how shares issued from treasury for the Employee Savings Plan get reported in Sedi.ca.
According to National Instrument 55-104 Insider Reporting Requirements and Exemptions, "Reporting Insiders" (i.e., officers and directors, but not the bulk of employees) would have to do insider reporting for shares acquired through the Employee Savings Plan matching contribution feature. This is because they have "beneficial ownership of, or control or direction over the securities, whether direct or indirect ..." in the plan, even though they cannot sell the shares for 5 years. However, there is an exemption in Part 5 for "Automatic Securities Purchase Plans". Automatic seems to mean the employee has to sign up for a pattern of regular contributions during the year at the beginning of the year. If they have discretion when the contribution is made during the year (say, based on the stock price at the time) then they lose the reporting exemption.
Once a year, (on January 12 2012 for calendar 2011), Bioniche submits to Sedi the report on share acquisitions under the plan on behalf of each employee. There is one entry for the tax-sheltered plan and one entry for the taxable plan in each person's profile. The insurance company administering the plan appears to be SunLife (the Company claimed this information is not public, but it's visible in Sedi.). Total shares issued in calendar 2011 to reporting insiders per Sedi was about 270,000 shares (total of tax-sheltered and taxable). Total per the managment information circular for Fiscal 2011 was 675,000 shares. So the rest of the employees account for about 400,000 shares. Curiously, McRae did not participate in the plan in 2011. His last participation was in 2010. Perhaps that has to do with his new employment contract ... maybe rendering him ineligible.
Based on the above, I am now convinced the Employee Savings Plan is not open to "gaming". I will therefore vote "for" increasing the share ceiling from 7 million shares to 10 million shares. I would still like to see the Directors put some sort of minimum valuation price on the shares issued from Treasury, but I'm probably whistling in the wind on that issue.