While we are waiting to see what the Alberta Securities Commission does on West High Yield (TSXV:WHY), I perused the bullboards to see if some investors still think this is a credible deal. The number one thing that confirmed was that there are a lot of gullible people posting on the bullboards. But one post prompted my interest, as it stated that WHY CEO Frank Marasco and his family control almost half of WHY shares. As it turns out, Frank and family really do control about 43% of WHY shares.
I had to do some digging to find out how much Frank paid for these shares. Going all the way back to the June 2006 WHY prospectus, I learned that the 20 million shares held by West High Yield Holdings Ltd. were acquired for less than the cost of a pizza. Ten dollars! If the deal is real, which of course I do not believe given the evidence to the contrary, then those 20 million shares alone could be worth C$326 million.
