RE:Request Help from Experts ATM vs Bought Deal Sharesct...interesting point and question
Frankly, I must admit that I didn't think of this possibility since as a general rule when a large company decides to raise money through and billion dollar equity sale, they do so through a bought deal deal with brokerage houses and usually at a discount to the prevailing market price at the time of the raise. The discount to the market depends on a number factors including the size of the raise and overall market sentiment. When this happens we usually see a PR explaining the raise and the price as you referenced for the earlier raise last year.
That said, as you you point out, ENB does have the option to sell Treasury Shares on its own and they make in fact be doing this. The interesting thing about this way is that ENB isn't under an obligation to announce such (daily) sales of stock since teach sale would not be deemed a significant and reportable event and is within the parsmeters of the approval document with the regulator - much the same as if they were doing the opposite like buying shares and then cancelling them (eg the purchase of shares by SU).
Sooo...how do you find out?
Well there are two avenues and both need to wait for the next Q report. In the Q report they may bury the announcement deep in the Q report or not report it at all depending on many shares were issued. The other way is to look at the number of shares outstanding in the Q report and see if the number is higher and by quite a bit than the previous reports. This number could be higher due to stock options etc issued to the BOD and employees but if they are issuing shares for the big raise then the increase in the number of shares would far outweigh any share grants being exercised.
Not sure of this helps or not.