RE:RE:Divvie cut priced inYou make sense and I hope you are right. It is always easy to say, "This time is different", and I have been thinking that very thing, because of the new SPA due anytime. I have been wondering if the shares would revisit the $2 barrier. We will see...
I watched Glencore buy out Viterra, and the process was above-board and beneficial for Viterra owners. That is another reason I have been buying Noranda. I don't actually mistrust GC as much as it appears from my postings. I do however mistrust the circumstances of the whole situation, and I know that Noranda is in a dodgy position, in terms of what GC could do to screw us around.
GC can easily afford to buy us out, and I think they should. Perhaps once the union contract has been settled they will look at it. The easiest way for them to do it is to offer us shares in GC itself, although silly me I don't think they trade on the TSX. You know GC shares have gone up by 400% this year on the OTC pink sheets? They are much better off than they were a year ago. Our tiny operation has a market cap of less than 90 million, excluding the shares GC already has, while GC is worth over 40 billion. It would be trivial for them to borrow enough to buy us out. Perhaps once they have more confidence in the larger global state of things they might take a look at us again. It would not surprise me if Noranda suddenly took off in the new year, once wimpy tax-sellers have gone away, but I'd be equally unsurprised if a divvie cut was announced too. It is of course in GC's interest to keep us in the dark, so we should not expect any news from them, to the good at least, until there's a fait accompli to announce. I think the only reason GC has not already bought the smelter is because of their own perilous debt position over the past few years, after commodity prices collapsed. Given revivals in oil, coal, zinc, and copper, GC is looking much better and they can buy the smelter if they want to. Short of buying it, the next best thing is to take advantage of it financially, by maximizing profit from it. Either GC will buy it, or they will mess with us (in an acceptable business-like way, of course). Given that an earlier offer at a much higher price than we have now was rejected, I would bet GC is going to take the latter course, but I would prefer the former, although at a price way over $3...
Jimmy Patison owned Sun-rype juices as a large minority holder, and took advantage of low share prices (due to investor uncertainty during the financial crisis) to buy out the rest at a very favourable price (to him). Nothing illegal there. Pollard Bank-note has 17 million of its 23 million shares held by one family, and they put out a 12 cent dividend annually, or something like 700 thousand bucks for the public shareholders - pathetic for a company with revenues over 200 million and good cash flow. There are no end of stories where shareholders failed to receive fair value when a large shareholder took charge, even without a majority. I would hate to see that happen to Noranda too. If I was GC I would be putting together an offer now to release in early January, making an offer around $3 a share. They might not get a majority, but they will get close, and they can make another move later on...