Cinema

There is no excuse for this kind of slip-up (may be a better word should be incompetence). I (and most of us here I would say) saw BOL NR almost right away on Tuesday 8 morning when the market opened. I have a watch list (on the Globe & Mail) that tracks about 50 companies including FNC and its "affiliations" such as CHM, RGX, and of course BOL. When BOL SP shot up and appeared on top of the list, I checked and saw the NR on BOL, but not on FNC. I have a "manual" system, but modern people, especially people in the IR business, can set up alerts and all kinds of fancy stuff to give them a stir when something under their watch is behaving abnormally.

Okay, fair enough. Let's say it's a rare occurrence for lapse of attention. But, nothing was done to correct this slip up, even after being contacted by investors discussing the NR from BOL and the lack of it from FNC (no excuse here). We are talking about some $15M, which is over 80% of the current market cap, coming into the kitty. This news item should be a lot more important than the NR talking about chasing more claims (Phoenix). It would seem that somebody is playing around with his hobby rather than putting the focus on a few key holdings.

As a reminder, in addition to the $15M from BOL FNC has approx 12M in RGX and $15M in CHM. Total worth = $42M compared to $17M market cap (dirt cheap!)

As indicated by other posters, who is minding the store here? Let start with the person at the bottom of the heap and replace him with someone else (no excuse). Get a competent one with a title "Director of Communications" and give this person enough authority to do the job. Also, neither the CEO and the Chairman seemed to pay any attention to this $15M deal. Did they talk to Sir Richard at all when they agreed on the deal and presumably the timing of the NR so that they can coordinate the NRs from both companies?

FNC has quite a few excellent ponies in the stable, but it just doesn't know how to develop them. What's the point in having more ponies? Sad situation.

goldhunter