Fortis Clearing announced to the ASX today a substantial shareholding in Bill Express. They have 49 million shares or 12.3% of Bill Express. This was a non-cash transaction – the shares were acquired “under the terms of existing stock borrowing agreement”. This from a Fortis ad on CareerOne:
Fortis Clearing Sydney Pty Limited is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Fortis Bank SA/NV, a global banking group incorporated in Belgium and the Netherlands. Fortis Clearing Sydney generates the majority of its revenue from the provision of third party clearing services to the financial services industry. The company operates predominantly in Australia, and employs approximately 36 staff across its operations.
It will be interesting to see if this changes things for newsagents. Today has seen plenty of movement – groups of newsagents organising to get together to fight against Bill Express, more newsagents lodging complaints with various statutory authorities and all through this silence from Bill Express back to newsagents who have contacted them.
Fortis have only become a substantial shareholder by virtue of someone (possible management but it’s not clear) being at the mercy of the bank. It may not mean much, but the possibility of Fortis selling shares hangs over the company. Much like Opes, Lift Capital, and others..
Margin Calls. Expect to see a change in director interest notice in the next couple of days.
An opportunitistic company such as Fortis or fund managers may hold on to these, since the price is so low, it encourages takeovers. Holding 10% of all issued capital makes a pretty big player in takeover negotiations can can ruin a takeover bid – eg: QANTAS.
Another company that purchased 4.5 mil shares at the start of Mar 08 may be kicking themselves. The Scrip purchased has lost 50% in 6 weeks.