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ARGD (6.5% 2042 IG senior BB, callable, Brookfield, CY 7.8%) two days running hot after almost three months of sideways (where it looked underpriced to me). Now the sideways looks like a consolidation setting up a rally.
good comment argd/igib pair has gone from over 2 sigma rich in december 2023 to 2sigma cheap and multiple bottoms last month ..currently trading near 1 sigma cheap ..would expect continued outperformance
I paid 20.89 for AGRD 8.30 YTM tks for show
why is atco-h over $30
Shenanigans
James and Maine,
Conjecture on my part – perhaps ATCO is buying them back in the hopes they can buy all of them. Maybe something to do with saving filing fees?
According to my notes, yesterday they redeemed all but ~2.4% of the shares, so they don’t have very many to buy back. I think someone a while ago posted that BAC was doing that with BACRP, paying crazy high prices to do it.
If it is ATCO buying them back, I don’t know why they didn’t just redeem all the shares and pay just $25 for each, instead of >$30 for these remaining shares.
ATCO-H is a low float issue now after about 99% was redeemed on 07/10 with only 120,000 shares remaining (or $3 million par value). There were likely “accidental” shorts who sold all of the shares not realizing that most of these shares were already redeemed about a month ago
through a lottery system. The demand from short sellers must be driving up the price today.
That makes sense. Phestwr had similar logic, as posted on X.
https://x.com/phester/status/1943735681185907061?s=46
I actually tried to sell my shares but Fidelity didn’t let me, saying they were already set for redemption, even though they were still listed in my account.
I don’t know but I just sold my remaining four shares for $35 AH at Schwab. Wish I could have sold all 400 at that price but oh well.
LANDO LANDP
https://www.gladstonefarms.com/investors/news-events/press-releases/detail/354/gladstone-land-announces-preferred-stock-repurchase
MCLEAN, VA / ACCESS Newswire / July 11, 2025 / Gladstone Land Corporation (Nasdaq:LAND) (“Gladstone Land” or the “Company”) announced that its board of directors has authorized a share repurchase program for up to $20,000,000 of the Company’s 6.00% Series B Cumulative Redeemable Preferred Stock (Nasdaq: LANDO) and up to $35,000,000 of the Company’s 6.00% Series C Cumulative Redeemable Preferred Stock (Nasdaq: LANDP) (together, the “Preferred Stock Repurchase Program”). The repurchases are intended to be implemented through open market transactions on U.S. exchanges or in privately negotiated transactions, in accordance with applicable securities laws, and any market purchases will be made during applicable trading window periods or pursuant to any applicable Rule 10b5-1 trading plans. The timing, prices, and sizes of repurchases will depend upon prevailing market prices, general economic and market conditions and other considerations. The board’s authorization of the Preferred Stock Repurchase Program expires July 10, 2026, and the Preferred Stock Repurchase Program may be suspended or discontinued at any time and does not obligate the Company to acquire any particular amount of preferred stock.
Good news. I bought more in the mid-19’s and would gladly flip some of it in the 20’s. Don’t want too much of this mediocre company but I’ll always hold some because LANDO and LANDP often diverge in price creating arb trades.
As an aside, if LAND is going to buy back O and P when its current yield = 7.50%, then that implies they are not planning to let LANDM go to 8% coupon on 1/31/26.
2wr–this somewhat surprises me given that they have a mandatory redemption coming up soon (January 2026) which they have floated the possibility of not redeeming and paying a penalty rate instead.
I’m not certain, but could purchasing O and/or P in the $20 range be a way to goose reported profits in the quarter? I’m not accountant savvy enough to know for sure.
Yeah, it would.
selling something at 25 and buying it back at 20 will improve their balance sheet by recognizing a gain on retirement of the preferred shares.
Ramaco (METC), common is up 30% today:
Tweet from US Department of Energy:
The groundbreaking discovery at the Ramaco Brook Mine marks a turning point for America as the first new rare earth facility in 7 DECADES, containing 1.7 MILLION tons of rare earth oxides.
Developing American supply chains for rare earth minerals STRENGTHENS our energy security.
*******************************************************
The Brook Mine project, Wyoming’s first new coal mine in more than 50 years, has been years in the making since Ramaco first submitted its permit application to mine in 2014, according to Global Energy Monitor
to add a little context here.
They accidentally stumbled across a figurative (and almost literal) gold mine when looking for coal to mine.
Tex, thanks for the update. Ramaco was brought to my attention here by “dJ”. Based on today’s action an investment in METC would have been nice. Instead I invested in their senior 8.375% note METCZ. METCZ is also up today with 1% gain. Nice to hear more positive news from the company.
Possible call of METCZ won’t be until 11/30/26.
Also x-div 7/15
This arrived in email today from The Other Site:
“You Now Get Unlimited News Access—For Free
Your free Seeking Alpha membership just got even better.
You now have unlimited access to all the news stories on our platform—no paywall and no restrictions.
This includes breaking headlines and earnings alerts, along with timely coverage of market-moving events.
Whether you’re tracking a single ticker or the entire market, you’ll get fast, accurate insights—right when they matter most.
There’s no additional step required. Just open the app or visit Seeking Alpha in your browser to start reading”
I’ve never paid for anything there, although long ago I set alerts on a few stocks. So I receive headlines in email, but just got used to not being able to read the article (due to the paywall).
Has anyone else received this message?
No Bur–sounds like spam to me.
They is a menu selection on the Seeking Alpha website called “News Free”.
I write from Italy. I’ve received the same message.
Hello Fabrib – I’ll have just a few days to hike in the Dolomites in late August. Would you have any recommendations on places to stay or even hikes?
Ciao, I live in Milan. I highly recommend you to visit Merano.
https://www.passionedolomiti.com/localita/merano-e-dintorni/
Perfect! Grazie Mille!
..I paid 23.21 (22.74 stripped) for TWO-A . approximately 14% yield to 4/27/27 call date.. TWO-A/SJNK pair has gone from near 3 sigma rich near Liberation day to near 2 sigma cheap today (1yr horizon based on stripped price) .. this is all presumably on back of 200mm continency liability
Thanks for posting! I like the yield-to-call on this one. But there’s already another issue ahead of it in the stack: TWO-C, which is past its call (1/2025) and currently floating at 5.01% over SOFR. The float spread isn’t quite as rich, but it’s close — and it’s already floating with a current yield around 9.95%. These go ex-div tomorrow, too.
For those looking at fixed maturities, TWO also has senior notes (TWOD) due 8/15/2030, with a 9.375% coupon and a current yield around 9.12%. XDiv on 8/1.
I was looking to deploy some cash so thanks to mjtroll and FL_Guy for the tip regarding TWO-C, which met my investment objectives and I purchased at $24.37 this afternoon.
I once held a good amount of TWO-A/B sold out when the price got too high. Bought back a moderate amount of A under 23 now looking to cash out on tomorrows dividend capture if I can get a good price. May be a good hold for the eventual float rate but that’s not normally something the average investor fully appreciates so I’m playing against their logic.
Was holding Atlas Corp 7.125% notes due 2027 (ATCOL). They were redeemed 7/7/25. Received the principal payment, but have not received the accrued/unpaid interest. With Schwab, has anyone else had an issue?
I owned ATCOL at Fidelity. Like you, I have received the principal but have not received the accrued interest yet. Probably just delayed a few days.
or in other words, just a few days where somebody/some entity will have free use of your money, paying you nothing with very little incentive to speed up the process. obviously a pet peeve of mine………
Here we go again – From IR: “The bond principal and accrued interest were both paid by Atlas to the bond custodian. You should receive both amounts. If you have not, please speak with your broker as they will have more information regarding your specific account.”
We’ll see what happens tomorrow before wasting more time..
Thanks 2w
ATLOC – Received a call this morning from my ir at Schwab who’s team spoke with Atlas, their intention is to pay the interest accrued and payable on 7/30. Grateful, at least we are hearing the payment in on the way…
The next question you should ask your ir at Schwab is what amount of interest do they intend to pay on 7/30? Is it the interest due up until 7/30 or up until 7/7?
Received everything today from Schwab
From IR: “The bond principal and accrued interest were both paid by Atlas to the bond custodian. You should receive both amounts. If you have not, please speak with your broker as they will have more information regarding your specific account.”
I’ll bet a steak dinner this is a complete lie, and if they did pay both, I’ll bet they paid them as separate amounts and the bond custodian couldn’t figure out that it was the interest payment on a redemption.
And this impacts EVERY broker and EVERY broker will fix it at the same time.
So bothering your broker over it isnt going to make the process go any faster.
As far as compensation, there is a standard formula for calculating it, and it should be part of the interest payment (AND PAID BY ATLAS AND NOT YOUR BROKER) , since it is going to be over 3 weeks late.
gs and others: Did you check your Fidelity account late today? I understand they removed the principal post of the 8th, then put it back, then removed it again. Oh, but they did post the accrued interest. Their explanation is that Atlas caused that to happen, not them. Apparently Schwab has not posted anything, though (at least, not yet). Rather a surprise to see that happen in the waning hours of business today. Hope no one’s account goes negative with that move.
SNewman,
thanks for flagging the Fidelity discrepancy and timing on the ATCOL redemption. It helped clarify what I was seeing in my account….
I see nothing at Schwab. Oddly enough ETrade backed out the principal previously credited today and then posted one aggregate amount for purportedly the same amount of principal plus an additional amount which must be the interest due… I’ve not double checked the amount for accuracy yet….. And surprise surprise I see NOTHING in the way of payment of ATCO-D due yesterday.
I did get this update from IR for the record: “We understand the principal and accrued interest was paid by the Trustee to DTC and have made inquiries regarding further distribution of accrued interest to the beneficial owners. DTC confirmed that the accrued interest portion will be paid today, July 11, 2025.”
Either very late in the after hours session Friday or after the after hours session of Friday, Fidelity un-did their final removal of ATCOL principal. I would have thought that baby bond redemptions would be a frequent enough occurrence that they would run flawlessly by now. The Fidelity rep. pointed to Atlas as being at fault, but we’ve not had reports here that other brokerages had the sequence that Fidelity had. If others did, I would be interested in hearing about that.
Snewman,
I’ll skip the details re the multiple calls I had with Fido yesterday. I’ll just say that on July 8 I got the principal (1 day late) but no interest, then yesterday I got the interest, but simultaneously they undid the principal. They said they’re “passive” participants – that their entries reflect what DTC has them doing. They said they’re monitoring this and will have one of their back office (?) people contact DTC about what’s going on.
2wr, I sold my ATCO-D on July 9, the day before it was redeemed. Sold for $25.38+, about the same as the $25 + ~$0.386 partial div. Good thing, as it’s one less item for me to track what the broker’s doing.
Here’s to hoping we get through the WTFCM/P and UMBFP redemptions unscathed!
Everyone should understand that the standard Fidelity policy is to “shadow post” principal, interest and dividends to the account when they are expected to be received. You can view this after midnight on your Fido account.
IF the expected payment is NOT received, the Fido system, backs out aka removes it from the account, typically way after the 4Pm EST standard close time.
This is exactly the behavior that is being described, so Fidelity followed their book.
Some brokerages do it the same. Other brokerages do NOT post the proceeds until they hit the brokerage back office account.
Other brokerages manage to not properly process the proceeds on time, even when they were properly received from DTC.
TX2:
Well, here they backed out two payments, one from 3 days before, and one from the same day. And then even later in the day they un-did the second back-out. Also, here their rep claimed that Atlas itself pulled both of those out rather than the Fidelity system doing that. So, this doesn’t seem to be quite that book to me.
ETRADE has removed mine, but no $ at all -grrr.
Nothing today from ET– anyone get theirs, or not?
conversation right now with Schwab, not ETrade. Supposedly it’s a known issue and they are looking into it for all Schwab clients blah blah blah, but we don’t know when you clients will get your money.
2WR funny you mentioned both Schwab and ETrade. I think you mentioned you recently opened up the ETrade account.
The reason it caught my eye is I have been assigned my very own personal nudge at Fidelity.
He wants me to move my account at Schwab to Fidelity so I have everything there.
Schwab is my trading account and it’s not big enough so that he can offer any incentives to get me to move.
Any thoughts on keeping 2 brokerage accounts?
Random comment. Not that I like Schwab since they took over TD but I have observed I have had more fill orders better than my GTC bids with them compared to Fidelity.
My philosophy is that if one account is breached, I still have the other. Not putting all my eggs in one basket. I’m small potatoes, so consolidating at one broker would not earn me big customer benefits.
I have three brokers. One is inherited. One used to be a mutual fund account, but I was forced to transition it to a brokerage account. Fidelity is my trading account.
You may not qualify for a transfer incentive, but you may increase your holdings to where you are entitled to more benefits.
Mystrified, my feelings also, with having 2 brokers.
I’m already assigned to an advisory group with Fido but since I do my own thing I don’t use them much.
ATLOC – Received a call from my rep at Schwab who’s team spoke with Atlas, their intention is to pay the interest accrued and payable on 7/30.
But- you got the $25 per share?.
You didn’t?
Not at Etrade
that is somewhat surprising. They are on Morgan Stanley’s back office system.
Every other broker paid the principal but not the interest.
Justin – did your broker back out the principal payment late today?
A positive sign for those holding the old Phoenix / Nassau QUIBS..
They were able to get off a senior 5 year note at 7 7/8, and upsized.
Fitch also rated them.
And thanks to Mr. Gridbird for putting this pup on the radar.
https://news.nfg.com/news/
https://www.fitchratings.com/research/insurance/fitch-publishes-ratings-to-nassau-financial-group-lp-subsidiaries-07-07-2025
Maine,
What is the symbol for the QUIBS?
It was delisted from the stock exchange a few years ago and now only trades via the bond desk. You can get it via full service brokers or the likes of Schwab / Fidelity w a phone call.
Cusip: 71902E208
https://www.finra.org/finra-data/fixed-income/bond?symbol=PNX3814338&bondType=CA
Maine,
Has the company been delivering financials required by the indenture, and have you ever seen them? I’m guessing they have or they wouldn’t have been able to do this offering.
QOL – CUSIP: 71902E208 It says TEMP55 for symbol but have never known what that’s supposed to mean.
This is fantastic news. Company seems to be performing well. These quibs have been dark for so long but I still think they’ll be paid out at par in 2032.
III’ers are aware of California and Hawaii Electric Utilities causing fires due to downed power lines. We went threw that a few years ago with Pacific Gas and Electric (PCG). And we went through that this year with Southern California Edison(SCE/EIX) in the Los Angeles area. The Lahaina fire was conclusively started by downed power lines from Hawaiian Electric(HE). All of these have outstanding preferreds/trusts and/or bonds, so the question of liability for the fires is a concern for III’ers.
Hawaiian Electric aka Maui Electric has taken definitive steps to prevent fires caused by high winds and dry brush. They have installed monitoring stations around Maui trying to proactively spot potential problems. And they ARE turning off the power feeds when they sense potential issues. Consumers can randomly lose their power for an indeterminate amount of time. Gotta be good for Generac back up power sales.
Most recent example occurred yesterday 7/6/25, with power restored today ~20 hours later
****************************************************
HONOLULU, July 6, 2025 – Power will remain off overnight for approximately 330 customers affected by the Public Safety Power Shutoff in parts of Upcountry Maui. Once hazardous conditions improve, Hawaiian Electric will start the process of restoring service. The company activated its Public Safety Power Shutoff program due to high winds and dry conditions.
Before service can be restored, power lines and other utility equipment must first be inspected and any damage must be repaired. This may involve ground crews and aerial inspections using helicopters and drones, which is the reason for the extended outage.
“We sincerely apologize and ask for our customers’ continued patience. The safety of the public and our crews is our top priority. We will work as quickly as possible to ensure power can be restored safely without creating any additional hazards,” said Jim Alberts, Hawaiian Electric senior vice president and chief operations officer.
Under its PSPS program, Hawaiian Electric may proactively shut off power in communities with high exposure to wildfire risk during severe weather conditions. Customers in these areas are urged to implement their own emergency plans and prepare for the possibility of extended power outages.
Maps of specific areas on each island that have high wildfire risk and may be subject to a PSPS can be found on Hawaiian Electric’s website. For more information, call Hawaiian Electric’s PSPS hotline at 1-844-483-8666 toll-free or go to hawaiianelectric.com/PSPS.
PG&E has a similar program. I ow, PCG-A.
These sort of steps that HE is taking have long been done by PCG and SCE. It’s the best practice and will definitely significantly reduce the chance their equipment starts a fire.
Long term, HE will need to harden infrastructure, similar to what PCG and SCE have been doing for years. Despite all these steps, sometimes their equipment still causes massive fires that cause 10s of billions of dollars and kill many people. Spending billions of dollars hardening infrastructure is a bitter pill to swallow but there’s no other way to prevent these fires that cause damage on the order of 10s of billions. Not to mention the loss of life and impacts to health from bad air quality.
Fortunately for the utility companies, all those costs related to preventing fires can be passed onto consumers. The resulting high electricity rates are a burden for consumers but better than loss of property and life.
Sound Point Meridian Capital Announces Offering of Series B Preferred Shares (SPME incoming)
https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20250707559015/en/Sound-Point-Meridian-Capital-Announces-Offering-of-Series-B-Preferred-Shares?feedref=JjAwJuNHiystnCoBq_hl-bV7DTIYheT0D-1vT4_bKFzt_EW40VMdK6eG-WLfRGUE1fJraLPL1g6AeUGJlCTYs7Oafol48Kkc8KJgZoTHgMu0w8LYSbRdYOj2VdwnuKwa
I bought SPMA. Usually bad news when a new one is issued soon after The old one typically goes down a small amount.
J any talk of what the interest rate is going to be?
Charles, can’t find any yet.
Will post as soon as I hear something unless jerrymac post something first
Thanks J
2,000,000 shares @ 7.875%
rated ‘BBB’ by Egan-Jones Ratings Company
Thanks, Charles.
Like SPMA, SPME is a term preferred.
Still awaiting the FWP with other details, such as the maturity date.
SOUND POINT MERIDIAN CAPITAL PRICES OFFERING OF PREFERRED SHARES
NEW YORK – July 8, 2025 – Sound Point Meridian Capital, Inc. (the “Company”) (NYSE: SPMC) today announced that it has priced an underwritten public offering of 2,000,000 shares of its 7.875% Series B Preferred Shares due 2030 (the “Preferred Shares”) at a public offering price of $25 per share, which will result in net proceeds to the Company of approximately $48.2 million after payment of underwriting discounts and commissions and estimated offering expenses payable by the Company. The Preferred Shares are rated ‘BBB’ by Egan-Jones Ratings Company, an independent rating agency. In addition, the Company has granted the underwriters a 30-day option to purchase up to an additional 300,000 shares of Preferred Shares on the same terms and conditions.
The Preferred Shares offering is expected to close on July 15, 2025, subject to customary closing conditions. The Company intends to list the Preferred Shares on the New York Stock Exchange within 30 days of the original issue date under the symbol “SPME.”
Things seem to be going according to my crystal ball. Of course Egan Jones.
History repeats itself, just never in the exact same way.
Other countries have lowered their rates and it seems we are still the least dirty sock in the laundry. Companies are borrowing and issuing new debt and slowly the rate is coming down. This should make SPMA rise in price or at the very least SPME should be discounted to par.
Investors are still chasing yield and our options are shrinking. How long does it go on before it reverses who knows?
Two options long term. Things collapse and rates go even lower as lenders and the government try to spur the economy or lenders will require higher rates to lend money.
I just don’t know where the market and the economy are headed. I was too young to invest in the late 60’s and early 70’s but I do remember when I started investing in the very late 70’s and early 80’s
Rates were sky high and as they came down lots of things started to happen.
Prospect Capital Survivor Notes
https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1287032/000128703225000181/a20250707-pps154115421543.htm
STRK/STRF/STRD
I’m not sure if anyone else is following these but the STRF is up over $3 and STRD is down.
In the past these have realigned slowly throughout the day. I noted STRF could not be shorted at Fidelity but isn’t very hard to borrow.
I’m into this for a nice big loss courtesy of after hours market Thursday. I wrongly concluded someone was stuck in a few shares and needed to cover the STRF
I am very interested in them.
But, at least at the moment, I don’t see an obvious play. STRK has a current yield of 6.6%, which seems low for what it does, but the borrow isn’t cheap and there’s not a lot to go around.
I *am* on the short MSTR / long IBIT pair trade but that is more of a long term thing as the MSTR premium (hopefully) gets priced out.
O,
I am losing a small fortune on the “somewhat of an arb” between STRF and STRD.
The first is the cum 10% prfd and the latter the non cum “sub” prfd.
“News” if it can be called that is nonsense about MSTR eligibility for being added to SP 500, as bitcoin further infects the financial system.
At the current borrow rate I could hold a long time , but I don’t have any faith in this thing not going haywire.
The very idea posited by crypto sites that MSTR going to the 500 should be the cause of the preferreds rallying 15% into a rising rate environment seems spurious to me.
I note this is a tough arb to do as IB is requiring 200% margin to initiate a shprt of a prfd!
That likely has something to do with the wider spread as few arbs want to play here.
My thought is the decent five figure loss I have needed to be checked regardless of what otherwise SHOULD happen, so I reduced the position 50% yesterday. I’ll be playing around the open.
> I am losing a small fortune on the “somewhat of an arb” between STRF and STRD.
Oh, I see the trade. What you’re doing makes sense, but who knows what Saylor’s doing with the at-the-market offerings, he could be blasting out much more STRD than STRF.
It’s a tough game to play against him but I agree it can’t last forever.
I sold my STRF and switched to STRD at the IPO. I held my STRK. STRF is more desirable but I thought the prices would converge at some point and if they do I will switch back into STRF. The $30 spread seems excessive and holding STRF appears to have been the better trade.
CSWCZ at risk of losing money if called. It is a 7.75% coupon with first call date of 8/1/25. It will pay interest of 0.48 then, but it closed yesterday, 7/3, at 25.55. It requires 30 day call notice which I did not see posted. But it is continuously callable after 8/1. A troubling sign is that they had $140 million in 4.5% notes due in 2026, they called early in Q4 2024. So if they called 4.5% coupon notes, might indicate these 7.75% notes are in their call list near term.
Tex, I am looking to fill in a few gaps in my wife’s income so I was looking at Tim’s lists that show payment month and that was one that caught my eye.
Have to do some more digging.
GAINL is another one to be aware of. Callable on 8/1/2025 though I am not sure of the exact terms. I am in it at under $25 so I will be safe in the event of a call. Assuming it is still possible on 8/1.
Sixth Street Completes Acquisition of Enstar
Enstar intends to voluntarily withdraw its depositary shares….
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/sixth-street-completes-acquisition-enstar-123900683.html
Anyone buying? ESGRO at 19 per share is a 9.2% yield. Interesting.
fc – If Enstar had some baby bonds or perpetual debentures such as the Brookfield issues, I would be all over this at that yield.
But you can tell the way the preferred is reacting here, leaning toward a legit probability it joins team Darth Vader in the dark market.
Oh for sure it is going to the expert market. One has to consider that as a 100% probability in my mind. I just find the expert market not to be the deciding factor if the preferred will get paid on time and possibly one day redeemed. I have already dealt with this exact situation successfully.
Now this is non-cum which is definitely a big minus but a couple of low ball bids won’t hurt. Below 19 for sure. A few layered bids hoping for sheer panic. Not backing up the truck but a few hundred shares will not hurt to juice the old higher risk bucket yield. Expert market is full of preferred still being paid like clock work.
Frankly I doubt I will own any unless people recklessly dump it.
fc, I’d be onboard with some type of definitive maturity date. Having said that, its tempting to put a very very small amount into this to the point of not really caring if it goes belly up.
Besides the initial sell off by someone driving the price below 18.50 for a moment in time it is looking like there are enough interested buyers at approx 19 where I will not be getting any shares. Almost like the days of a preferred going dark meant selling at any price is over with. Enough people seem to have become more comfortable with the concept and this gives support right up until it is taken off the major exchange.
But yea. I am on board with how you are thinking. Both you and theta make excellent points. The situation is less predictable then it could be if this was a slightly different security situation.
Press release indicated July 14 (or thereabouts) as when their delisting notice would be filed with Nasdaq. Maybe buyers will slow down as we move closer to that date. 10% would be a nice round number, lol
Keep in mind that Enstar was in bed with the Zyskind and Karfunkel cabal that controled Amstar when they went private (and when they killed Maiden holdings). Preferred holders got screwed in both cases, IIRC.
Enstar was the company that got to purchase all the productive maiden assets in a sweetheart deal (as part of a bigger payoff from Amtrust) and left shareholders with nothing. All stank pretty badly (as you would expect from slimy Zyskind and Karfunkel management).
I wouldn’t trust Enstar one inch. Once they go dark, I would expect that they would follow the playbook from Maiden and screw shareholders every way possible.
Just an opinion. DYODD
Private, Good point. I had forgotten all that. It will definitely dissuade me from buying this I think.
Thanks for the reminder Private. I got out of Maiden without getting burnt.
The recent LNG shipper that stripped all the assets and left a shell to cover the preferred was another I passed on. I was tempted to put in a low ball order until you woke me up
Delisting is 90 days post-filing, if I am not mistaken:
“Following the effectiveness of the Form 25s, the Company intends to file with the SEC a certification on Form 15 requesting the termination of registration of Enstar Ordinary Shares and the Depositary Shares under Section 12(g) of the Exchange Act and the suspension of reporting obligations under Sections 13 and 15(d) of the Exchange Act. Such deregistration of the Enstar Ordinary Shares and the Depositary Shares will become effective 90 days after the filing of the applicable Form 25 or such shorter period as may be determined by the SEC. The Company’s reporting obligations under the Exchange Act will be suspended immediately upon the filing of Form 15.”
Thanks Costasco
Prefs are Non-cumulative, why would they keep paying dividend once delisted….?
I will approach it from the angle that a company that is functioning normally and is profitable will pay the dividend because that is the correct course of action if the company wants to be considered trust worthy. Especially in the arena of banking and insurance.
Now I am getting a bit outside of my area of expertise and I will probably explain this poorly. If they stop paying 4 to 6 dividends there is often a vote for 2 additional seats on the board.
Also since ESGR is a holding company this comes into play:
“Because Enstar Group Limited is a holding company and substantially all of our operations are conducted by our main operating subsidiaries, our ability to meet any ongoing cash requirements and to pay dividends will depend on our ability to obtain cash dividends or other cash payments or obtain loans from these subsidiaries.”
So would not Enstar being bought out now become a subsidiary of another holding company who cannot get any money from it unless a dividend/distribution was paid out to the common shareholders and thus the preferred get first shot at that money? They can get money out of it in different ways like services rendered, leasing them certain assets, etc.. but that only goes so far. I mean the sub has to distribute profits somehow and that is broken up by who owns what share of the company. The sub cannot just give that money out to the common shareholders without paying the preferred first right?
Someone please correct me if I am wrong. Naturally fraud or under handed shenanigans will make everything above pointless. Like skipping just enough dividends to not cause a vote for additional board seats and then paying out dividends to everyone thus saving some money. Or recklessly stripping the company of all value and leaving a shell of a company behind with preferred and common shares near worthless.
Hi FC,
There are LOTS of ways to screw preferred shareholders.
Lawyers keep writing ever more complicated offering documents to say how the company won’t be able to do so, but there are always highly paid folks on the other side who get paid a lot of money to find ways to get around the documents.
The thing that keeps most companies from doing bad things to shareholders is that they will need to go back to the public market at some point to raise new capital/debt. if they screwed shareholders the last time, they will have a hard time selling their shares the next time.
Once that need/ability is gone (like when they delist/go dark), the practical protections for shareholders shrink.
If you want to see an example, go look through the history of Amtrust/Maiden Holdings from a few years ago. Amtrust went private/dark and screwed preferred holders.Then the folks that controlled Amtrust raided Maiden (which was public, but controlled by the Amtrust owners) by selling off all the productive assets to Enstar in a “sweetheart” deal (and Enstar was apparently involved in the Amtrust transaction to pay off the Amstar management folks). Didn’t appear to violate the Maiden contracts, but certainly screwed the shareholders.
I am sure others can name examples too.
To me, once a management team has taken any action to “cheat” like this, I simply won’t have anything to do with them – either as an investor or as a professional. Our companies try to maintain a “we won’t work for scum” -policy, even though it costs us money – it helps us sleep better at night.
How did Amtrust screw the preferred holders? I held mine and they have not missed a payment yet.
https://www.tenlaw.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/AmTrust_FinancialServices_2019.pdf
Well on the bright side the case was resolved to the tune of 13 million.
https://www.wolfpopper.com/cases-investigations/AmTrust
I guess that means companies have to be slightly more careful pulling this stunt when they know exactly what will happen in courts?
I lost thousands when they delisted (with no warning). I have just about got the money back now in dividends but it was one of my biggest hits.
They are rated by Fitch /S&P / AM Best.
How can they afford not to pay their preferreds without hurting their ratings, which, in my opinion, is going to harm their ability to conduct their insurance business?
Because the ratings agencies will give an A rating to a dead cow or a company on the day before the bankruptcy filing if you throw a lot of business their way.
Hate to admit it Private, I bought 200 shares Dec 26th in my Fido account ( not my wife’s) for $15.25 just to prove Fido was allowing transactions. Funny thing is with all this discussion I had an open limit order and sold the last today for $16.35 so I collected 2 dividends at about 12.25% and a 1.10 a share in capital gains.
To be honest, this is not something I wanted to hold hoping I would collect in 30 yrs.
The dividends are non-cumulative, so no downside to not paying in quarters where they are not extracting from common.
I sold all of my preferreds, worried they will stop dividends after delisting, and price will go to single digits!
also, I should mention to US investors holding this in a taxable account.
Future dividends will be non-qualified, because the stock market listing was the reason they were qualified, and once that is gone, so is the qualified status.
As expected, FHN-B is getting called before it floats:
https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/first-horizon-corporation-announces-redemption-of-series-b-preferred-stock-and-corresponding-series-b-depositary-shares-302496068.html
US Dollar Index ~ another 52-week low hit today at 96.81. Value has dropped from Jan 9 high of 109.65.
Not breaking news. Just a notice. ATH-C, (which is listed on the F-to-F and Floating page as redeemable on 9/30) was actually redeemed yesterday.
Yeah Roger, I took the money and rolled it over into the SEAL PB yesterday. Shipping wasn’t what I was looking for, I wanted another insurance preferred but it was unexpected so I hadn’t been looking for a replacement.
Thank mjtroll for that one.
im looking for replacements for it. thinging of 1/2 into RCC and the other half into rjf-b
RJF-B would be nice if it were floating- but 2 yrs off even though callable a yr ago- an oddball.
If anyone here has STRK, there are some fantastic after-hours prices right now if you’d like to sell. I just got $126 for mine, which puts it at a current yield of less than 6.5%.
Not sure what’s going on to cause the spike, but maybe an ETF had to lift all the asks near the close.
Given that MSTR will can start issuing more through their ATM offering I doubt this will last long.
O. Chongusu – Appreciate the heads up. I can’t believe all I did was buy these when they first came out and now have a paper unrealized gain of 50%+.
I don’t think this has ever happened before in the history of perpetuals, meaning this specific sequence of events i.e. just buying from issue date. Not buying during say a market collapse [2008/2009] when many preferreds dropped to single digits and then riding them back up years later.
I love the fight between Saylor and Chanos over crypto treasury companies
I bot seal/prb at 25 as the seal-b/sjnk pair has gone from over 2 sigma rich in march to over 2 sigma cheap today (1yr horizon) much of this can be explained by payment of quarterly dividend… although friday it closed at 25.89 and the dividends is 51 cents…good article on S/A
Seapeak Preferred Shares: Earning 8-9% Yields With LNG Shipping
May 04, 2025 10:40 AM ETSeapeak LLC 9% PFD UT SER A (SEAL.PR.A) Stock, SEAL.PR.B StockSEAL.PR.A, SEAL.PR.B
mjtroll – Awesome alert. I think, maybe, not sure, there is a K1 for this one.
Theta, you beat me to it. But mjtroll will probably flip for a quick buck. Hopefully that is worth it, as or if the price recovers over the next couple weeks or months. Today was x-divy and it didn’t drop the .54 cents for the dividend so I expect it will recover.
I don’t think there is a K-1
per quantum on line
As a result, effective January 1, 2019, Teekay LNG will be treated as a corporation for U.S. federal income tax purposes and common and preferred unitholders will receive Form 1099s instead of Schedule K-1s relating to distributions taxable as dividends commencing in 2019.
Charles M – That’s a fantastic update! I can’t believe it’s been that many years now since I last looked at Teekay. I’m completely out of the loop on this for at least 5+ years then. It appears these preferreds are good-to-go as I imagine they would have gone dark/expert by now.
New York Mortgage Trust, Inc.
% SENIOR NOTES DUE 2030
https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1273685/000110465925063875/tm2519350-1_424b5.htm
9.875 area…
Thanks…their incremental borrow rate is creepy up.
currently 605 basis points above the US5Y — I’m lucky I don’t own any of the previously issued notes
Thanks jerrymac!
Got it J – thank you.
Argo Blockchain has announced a restructuring plan:
https://polaris.brighterir.com/public/argo_blockchain/news/rns/story/w3y70yx
ARBKL bondholders to be fully equitized under the proposed plan.
Argo’s common shares in London are currently down 65% on the news.
(Posted here because SPAM filter would not allow it in the Sandbox.)
(A big day in the SandBox!)
Extremely rare event you should understand if you invest in individual Muni bonds. A microscopically small city in Washington State declared Chapter 9 bankruptcy. They have some general obligation bonds outstanding, so conceivably they could suffer losses. 26/50 states currently allow Chapter 9 BK, meaning 24 do not allow it. The elephant waiting in the BK lounge is Chicago, but Illinois law does not currently allow it. Would NOT be surprised if they changed the law, retroactively.
Recall that states/territories could not declare BK, but Congress passed a law that allowed Puerto Rico to declare. It has been an epic and I mean epic disaster. The Puerto Rico Electric utility is still not out of BK after nine years! All thanks to a single district court judge allowing it happen. In the meantime, they have spent roughly $500 million on lawyers/consultants with no end in sight. It is the toast of the town at BK lawyer conventions!
BOTTOM LINE is that even with GO bonds, you have to understand the risk. Uninsured Puerto Rico GO bonds suffered major losses. Just like Detroit and others.
Disclosure: We do NOT hold any of this Washington City (Cle Elum) bonds in any account. We DO hold substantial amounts of insured Puerto Rico Electric bonds in multiple accounts that to date have paid off on time and in full.
From Bondbuyer.com
A small city in Washington state filed for Chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy after an adverse ruling from the arbitrator in a development dispute has the city facing insolvency.
Cle Elum, a city of 2,157 roughly 84 miles southeast of Seattle, filed for bankruptcy Tuesday.
City officials said they couldn’t reach an agreement with City Heights Holdings, LLC, over payment of a $25.9 million judgment related to a housing development.
In November, an arbitrator awarded the developer $22.2 million in damages at a 12% interest rate, which has since grown to the current total.
The typical issue size of their bonds is $30,000 …
Sewer bond issue was $25,000
I kind of like the idea of owning an entire town’s infrastructure
Wanna bet my HOA of 100 homes has more liability insurance by a factor of 10x?