Markets had a partial rebound on Tuesday with the S&P 500 up 0.8% and Toronto up 0.6%.
WSP Global was up 2.3% after reporting a 27% gain in earnings.
Shaw Communications is selling off its remaining shares in Corus entertainment by way of a secondary issue. Neither company is on our list but the sale illustrates a few things. The sales is being priced at a discount of about 16% to the current share price and on top of that Shaw will pay probably another several percent to the brokers who will sell these shares. Current Corus shareholders will no doubt be dismayed by this sale that pushes down the market value of Corus shares. And Shaw shareholders may also be dismayed at the large discount.
When it comes to the cost to sell shares retail investors actually face far lower costs than do large institutional share owners. Retail investors can usually sell tens of thousands of dollars worth of shares at the market price or at most a few pennies below. That is the case for liquidly traded shares. A Commission of $10 or less may be the only cost. That is truly a bargain. Meanwhile Shaw is facing costs in the order of 18% to quickly unload this huge position. And I recall that last year Metro faced a large discount when it sold a large block of Couche-Tard shares. Trading fees are a rare case where the little guy actually wins.