There’s no doubt about it any longer, Peter Marrone thinks the people holding YRI shares are stupid. This morning the hugely unpopular, crazily expensive, shareholder unfriendly spin-out of Brio Gold was closed by Yamana Gold (YRI.to) (AUY) was announced closed by the parent company. How unpopular? Allow this humble scribe to quote from the November 17th final prospectus NR:
The final prospectus qualifies the distribution of an aggregate of up to 59,225,957 Brio Shares at a price of C$3.25
per Brio Share (the “Exercise Price”) upon the exercise of up to an
aggregate of 59,225,957 Purchase Rights, for aggregate gross proceeds to
Yamana of up to C$192,484,360….…Brio Gold will become a standalone public company
effective as of the closing date of the Offering, with Yamana holding
46.3% (on a non-diluted basis) of the issued and outstanding shares of
Brio Gold. The closing date of the Offering is expected to occur on or
about December 23, 2016.
And now, today’s missive:
“A
total of 17,324,507 Brio Shares owned by Yamana were transferred
pursuant to the transactions …Yamana continues to be a significant
shareholder of Brio Gold, holding approximately 85% of the issued and
outstanding Brio Shares.”
Spot the difference? Yup, Marrone wanted to sell 59.2m shares and leave YRI with 46.3% of the company. Instead he’s only managed to find enough suckers to sell 17.3m shares and YRI still holds 85% of this collection of utter dog assets. But the real rip-off is how he’s managed to feather the nest of his pals Leticia and Gil; seriously, how many IR execs get a $300k guaranteed salary and $600k of free shares as a golden handshake? For doing precisely fark all? And Christmas has come early for Gil Clausen, who just cut himself a cheque for eight million dollars straight out of the pockets of YRI shareholders.
There ought to be a law. Well in fact there are. Several.