Worthington Share Discussion Threads

[tann93] 08/1/2019 13:07

Thanks Davidkip.
Agree with you re: NEX, but surely it would make sense to get WHET on to a more recognised listing?
What is happening with WRN, is it coming back?

[davidkip] 08/1/2019 12:04

tann93

No, they tried for NEX and were rejected at the 11th hour by the Exchange as a result of a blog entry by Aidan.

The NEX listing is off, and there are no immediate plans to seek a listing on any other exchange:



"Update 24 December 2018
Suspension of Trading on Britdaq pending announcement

The Directors of Whetstone Capital Group plc ("Whetstone" or "the Company") have noted the recent rise in the price of Whetstone shares traded on Britdaq. Trading in the shares was suspended at the request of the Directors on 20th December pending an announcement which we are now able to make. The Directors are aware of rumours that the Company’s shares are to be admitted to trading on a Recognised Investment Exchange. Whilst the Directors continue to consider the merits of such a listing this is unlikely to be in the immediate future."

Sorry.

That being said, with 8m shares traded on Britdaq in the last nine months or so, that's actually a helluva lot better than a lot of the stuff stuck on NEX (which I say from bitter personal experience, at least one of my positions goes for entire months without a single trade and make Flagship or RAP look like Apple w.r.t. liquidity!)

[andy] 08/1/2019 11:42

John,

:-)


I'll be going through South Acton soon too, then around 15 hours later I'll be in your neck of the woods for a day, I'll PM you the details.

[tann93] 08/1/2019 10:57

I keep checking this BB to see if progress has been made with WRN/WHET. I noticed that we may be listing on NEX? is this correct and do we have any timescales?

[johnbri4] 08/1/2019 10:52

Andy. Yes arrived back yesterday morning and man it is so much warmer in South Acton than Manchester.

[arthur_lame_stocks] 08/1/2019 10:41

Although possibly, David, the reputations of the team were so toxic and the stated strategy to deliver value so absurd that they didn't think that they'd be able to pursuade new investors to join, although looking at some of the junk that has come to market in the last couple of years only to rapidly collapse into oblivion, they may have been able to.

[davidkip] 08/1/2019 10:29

The simplest (and usual) way to get the free float requirement for NEX etc is simply to raise funds at the time of the IPO. That then capitalises the company for its next stage, and brings a load of new shareholders onto the register. There really wasn't any need to gift to solve that problem, since just about every other company on the planet who has IPOed has had to deal with it. It would have been a helluva lot less effort as well.

[davidkip] 08/1/2019 09:24

Andy - there was absolutely no legal compunction on WHET/GSC to delay Britdaq until the share certs had been distributed. Yes they said people would get a mirrored interest and be able to trade (and that has happened), but they never said they'd be at the front of the queue.

If we're talking about fiduciary duty under CA2006 etc, we also need to separate WHET from GSC. WHET didn't gift shares in WHET, GSC did. GSC choose to distribute, FOC, some of the shares it held in WHET to a group of other individuals. It did that.

Separately, WHET (the plc) chose to list on 'Blind Date' Britdaq. The fiduciary duty of WHET is to the WHET shareholders, so WHET has to decide what to do that is best for WHET and its SHs.

So, if we run with my model whereby GSC is in effect acting as a parallel placing and ongoing funder of WHET, it is in WHET's best interests to let GSC (via WE) 'go first' and dump as much WHET stock held by GSC as it could, in order to generate the cash to fund WHET [other models are available but let's run with this one].

Remember, there was no guarantee that trading in WHET would be anything more than a damp Phillo, despite the ramping by all and sundry. Just imagine if small werners had been allowed to sell ahead of GSC/WE and they then used up whatever limited buying pressure there was ... that would have meant by the time WE came to place those shares out, there was no remaining volume to do so. WHET would then have been up the proverbial creek without a paddle.

If ... and it is only an "if" ... those WE sells were part of the funding plan for WHET, then it was the right business decision to let WE sell ahead of hoi polloi.

[Of course, in other models where those sells are argued to have been purely for personal enrichment, yes I agree it would rather stick in one's craw. However, I do take a more generous view on what happened than many/most]

As an aside, in essence none of this is radically different in the end result than the sort of relationship a small AIM company like Regency Mines has with death-spiral (sorry, 'structured finance') providers like Yorkville. YA fund the company via a CLN, they convert and sell stock - in essence they are doing an ongoing placing alongside the company. The relationship between GSC and WHET is largely similar (although the implementation is somewhat different)