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Posts Tagged ‘Liquidation Value’

SOAP stockholders approve plan of liquidation; $3.75 dividend paid

Posted in Activist Investors, Greenbackd Portfolio, Mithras Capital, Net Cash Stocks, Soapstone Networks Inc (NASDAQ:SOAP), Stocks, tagged , , , , on July 30, 2009| 9 Comments »

Soapstone Networks Inc (NASDAQ:SOAP) has announced that the stockholders have approved the liquidation and dissolution of the company.

We started following SOAP (see our post archive here) because it was trading well below its net cash value with an activist investor, Mithras Capital, disclosing an 8.7% holding in October last year. The stock is up 68.4% from $2.50 when we initiated our position to close today at $4.13, giving SOAP a market capitalization of $61.0M. We last estimated the company’s net cash value to be $80.3M or $5.21 per share. The company has now announced that it proposes to liquidate. It estimates that the total distribution, including an extraordinary cash dividend of $3.75 per share, will be between $4.00 and $4.50 per share. The initial dividend was paid yesterday and the stock trade’s ex-dividend today.

The press release from the company is set out below:

BILLERICA, MA–(Marketwire – July 28, 2009) – Soapstone Networks Inc. (NASDAQ: SOAP), today announced that, at the Company’s annual meeting of stockholders held on July 28, 2009, the stockholders of Soapstone Networks voted to approve the liquidation and dissolution of the Company pursuant to a Plan of Liquidation and Dissolution (the “Plan of Liquidation”).

As previously announced by the Company, in connection with the approval of the Plan of Liquidation, the Company’s Board of Directors has approved an extraordinary cash dividend of $3.75 per share of the Company’s common stock. The dividend will be paid on July 29, 2009 and the Company’s stock will trade ex-dividend commencing July 30, 2009.

The Company intends to file a certificate of dissolution on July 31, 2009 with the Delaware Secretary of State in accordance with the Plan of Liquidation. At the close of business on July 31, 2009, the Company expects to close its stock transfer books and cease recording transfers of shares of its common stock. At that time, the Company’s common stock, and stock certificates evidencing the shares of common stock, will no longer be assignable or transferable on the Company’s books. We have notified Nasdaq OMX of the date we intend to file our certificate of dissolution, and we will seek to delist our shares of common stock as soon as practicable thereafter. In addition, we requested that the Nasdaq Global Market suspend the trading of our common stock effective at the close of business on July 31, 2009. After the Company ceases trading on the Nasdaq Global Market as a result of such suspension, shares of the Company’s common stock held in street name with brokers may be traded in the over-the-counter market on an electronic bulletin board established for unlisted securities such as the OTC Bulletin Board or the Pink Sheets. Such trading will reduce the market liquidity of the Company’s common stock. As a result, an investor would find it more difficult to dispose of, or obtain accurate quotations for the price of the Company’s common stock, if they are able to trade the Common Stock at all.

The Board of Directors has fixed July 31, 2009 as the record date for determining stockholders entitled to receive any future distributions of available assets and as the final date for the recording of stock transfers. Only those stockholders of record as of the close of business on July 31, 2009 (the “Record Stockholders”), will be entitled to such future distributions. The Company anticipates that its first distribution after the July 31, 2009 record date is not likely to occur prior to the first quarter of 2010. Prior to winding up its affairs under Delaware law, the Company intends to make at least one additional liquidating distribution to the Record Stockholders. The Company has not yet established the timing or per share amount of any such distributions.

[Full Disclosure:  We have a holding in SOAP. This is neither a recommendation to buy or sell any securities. All information provided believed to be reliable and presented for information purposes only. Do your own research before investing in any security.]

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Marty Whitman discusses Graham’s net-net formula

Posted in About, Liquidation Value, Net Current Asset Value, Net Quick Stocks, Net Quick Value, Stocks, tagged , , , , on July 28, 2009| Leave a Comment »

In the following video, legendary value investor Marty Whitman discusses Benjamin Graham’s net-net formula and his adjustments to it. We’ve previously covered those adjustments here, but we’ve added the video because we think it’s quite amazing to see the great man explaining his rationale for making them. The highlight, from our perspective, is this gem:

We do net-nets based more on common sense. As, for example, you have an asset – a Class A office building – financed with recourse finance, fully tenanted by credit-worthy tenants; That, for accounting purposes, is classified as a fixed asset, but, given such a building, you pick up the telephone and sell it, and really it’s more current than K-Mart’s inventories, for example, which is classified as a current asset. 

 Enjoy the rest of his wit below:

 

 

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Digirad Corporation (NASDAQ:DRAD) Q2 update

Posted in Digirad Corporation (NASDAQ:DRAD), Greenbackd Portfolio, Net Net Stocks, Stocks, tagged , on July 24, 2009| 3 Comments »

Digirad Corporation (NASDAQ:DRAD) has filed its 10Q for the quarter ended June 30, 2009.

We started following DRAD (see our post archive here) because it was an undervalued asset play with a plan to sell assets and buy back its stock. The stock is up more than 118% since we started following it to close yesterday at $1.92, giving the company a market capitalization of $36.1M. We last estimated the liquidation value to be around $29.5M or $1.56 per share. We’ve now increased our valuation to $32.5M or $1.73 per share following a very good quarter for DRAD, in which it generated over $2.2M in cash. DRAD has also now started to buy back stock under its previously announced $2M stock repurchase plan.

The value proposition updated

DRAD had a very good second quarter, generating $3M in operating cash flow and ending the quarter up more than $2.2M in cash. Our updated estimate for the company’s liquidation value is set out below (the “Book Value” column shows the assets as they are carried in the financial statements, and the “Liquidating Value” column shows our estimate of the value of the assets in a liquidation):

DRAD Summary 2009 6 30

Off-balance sheet arrangements and contractual obligations: The company hasn’t disclosed any off-balance sheet arrangements in its most recent 10Q. The contractual obligations as at December 31 were around $3.0M, around $1.4M of which falls due in the next 12 months to December 31, 2009.

The catalyst

DRAD’s board has announced a stock buyback program:

The Company also announced that its board of directors has authorized a stock buyback program to repurchase up to an aggregate of $2 million of its issued and outstanding common shares. Digirad had approximately 19 million shares outstanding as of December 31, 2008. At current valuations, this repurchase plan would authorize the buyback of approximately 2.1 million shares, or approximately 11 percent of the company’s outstanding shares.

Chairman of the Digirad Board of Directors R. King Nelson said, “The board believes the Company’s direction and goals towards generating positive cash flow and earnings coupled with an undervalued stock price present a unique investment opportunity. We are confident this will provide a solid return to our shareholders.”

According to the most recent 10Q, the company has now started to buy its own stock, albeit a relatively small amount:

On February 4, 2009, our board of directors authorized a stock buyback program to repurchase up to an aggregate of $2.0 million of our issued and outstanding common shares. The timing of stock repurchases and the number of shares of common stock to be repurchased are in compliance with Rule 10b-18 under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. The timing and extent of the repurchase depends upon market conditions, applicable legal requirements, and other factors. During the three and six months ended June 30, 2009, we repurchased 198,000 and 209,000 shares, respectively, of our common stock at a cost totaling $0.3 million at a weighted average price of $1.28 per share.

Conclusion

At its $1.92 close yesterday, DRAD is trading at a small premium to its $32.5M or $1.73 per share in liquidation value. We’re generally sellers of secondary securities trading at a premium to liquidation value, but DRAD seems to have the potential to transition to a cash generator. We’d like to see where it can go. We can see no other reason to cease holding DRAD in the Greenbackd Portfolio and so we’re going to maintain the position for now.

[Full Disclosure:  We do not have a holding in DRAD. This is neither a recommendation to buy or sell any securities. All information provided believed to be reliable and presented for information purposes only. Do your own research before investing in any security.]

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Blank checks: Fertile fishing grounds for liquidation value investors

Posted in Activist Investors, Liquidation Value, Net Cash Stocks, Stocks, tagged , , on July 22, 2009| 8 Comments »

In Blank Checks Firing Blanks (Breakingviews.com via NYTimes.com), Lauren Silva Laughlin and George Hay write about the recent performance of blank check companies, otherwise known as special-purpose acquisition corporations or SPACs. Blank checks are shell companies that raise money from the public in order to acquire a business the identity of which is not known at the time the capital is raised. The trick is that a deal must be consumated before a certain date or the funds must be returned to the investors.

Many of the blank checks raised in 2007 are running out of time to complete an aquisition. While some 2007 SPACs did manage to seal a deal, it seems most were unable to do so because of the turmoil in the markets and were forced to liquidate:

About 40 of 66 SPACs that started in 2007 have been liquidated or will probably end up being liquidated, according to SPAC Research Partners.

It turns out that those SPACs forced to liquidate have outperformed those that actually completed a transaction:

And SPACs that sat on cash and safe investments have actually outperformed those that did deals. Take the GSC Acquisition Company, established by GSC Group, a debt-focused investment firm. The SPAC’s bosses tried to acquire Complete Energy, a power producer. But the deal wasn’t completed in time, and GSC Acquisition was liquidated last month.

Investors received around $9.80 a share in cash, just shy of the $10 they paid in its initial public offering two years earlier.

Investors in SPACs that did deals haven’t been so lucky. Shares of Aldabra 2 Acquisition Corporation, for instance, have plunged more than 75 percent since that SPAC bought Boise Cascade’s paper, packaging and transportation business and changed its name to Boise Inc. in February 2008.

From a deep value investor’s point of view, SPACs present an interesting investment opportunity. The value analysis is simple enough: Most trade at a discount to net cash. The difficulty is in assessing which will actually return the cash and which will spray it away on an acquisition. In making such an assessment, it helps to have a large activist investor sitting on the register. Cue Daniel Loeb and Third Point LLC. Third Point’s most recent 13F filing shows a number of SPACs in Loeb’s portfolio, including the following (via Market Folly):

  1. Liberty Acquisition Holdings (LIA): 11.75% of Loeb’s portfolio
  2. Victory Acquisition Corp (VRY): 5% of Loeb’s portfolio
  3. Trian Acquisition (TUX): 4.95% of Loeb’s portfolio
  4. Triplecrown Acquisition (TCW): 4.35% of Loeb’s portfolio
  5. Global Brands Acquisition (GQN): 2.4% of Loeb’s portfolio
  6. Global Consumer Acquisition (GHC): 1.8% of Loeb’s portfolio

We haven’t looked at any of these in detail, but they might present a happy hunting ground for the liquidation value investor. We’ll return to these stocks if there’s further turmoil in the market.

[Full Disclosure: We do not have a holding in any of the securities listed above. This is neither a recommendation to buy or sell any securities. All information provided believed to be reliable and presented for information purposes only. Do your own research before investing in any security.]

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AVGN merger with MediciNova back on the table

Posted in Activist Investors, Avigen (NASDAQ:AVGN), Biotechnology Value Fund, Greenbackd Portfolio, Liquidation Value, Net Cash Stocks, Stocks, tagged , , , , on July 21, 2009| Leave a Comment »

Avigen Inc (NASDAQ:AVGN) is back in negotiations with MediciNova, Inc. regarding a proposed acquisition of AVGN by MediciNova. The consideration for the deal is AVGN’s “net cash liquidation value plus $3 million” and “a contingent payment right for a specific product program milestone payment associated with Avigen’s Assignment Agreement with Genzyme Corporation, potentially subject to certain adjustments.”

We started following AVGN in December last year (see archived posts here) because it was a net cash stock and specialist biotechnology investor Biotechnology Value Fund (BVF) was pushing it to liquidate and return its cash to shareholders. Despite BVF’s failure to remove the board, we continued to maintain our position in AVGN because BVF won a number of important concessions from the board that made AVGN a much more attractive stock than it was when we started following it. The stock price reflects this: AVGN closed yesterday at $1.32, up 103.8% from our $0.65 purchase price. We last estimated the net cash liquidation value at around $34M or $1.14 per share. Including the $3M from MediciNova would increase that value to around $37M or $1.24 per share. We believe that there is a reasonable chance that AVGN will yield more than its current $1.32 share price when the “contingent payment right” capturing the near term payments from Genzyme is taken into account. AVGN shareholders also have an option-like exposure to any value in AVGN’s AV411 assets and program, although we cannot estimate the value of this with any certainty.

The press release from AVGN regarding the business combination with MediciNova is set out below:

MediciNova and Avigen Confirm Understanding for Key Terms for a Business Combination

SAN DIEGO and ALAMEDA, Calif., June 25, 2009 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — MediciNova, Inc., a biopharmaceutical company that is publicly traded on the Nasdaq Global Market (Nasdaq:MNOV – News) and the Hercules Market of the Osaka Securities Exchange (Code Number:4875), and Avigen, Inc. (Nasdaq:AVGN – News), a biopharmaceutical company, today announced that they have confirmed their understanding of certain key terms for a proposed acquisition of Avigen by MediciNova that would combine the companies’ broad neurological clinical development programs based on ibudilast (Avigen’s AV-411 and MediciNova’s MN-166).

MediciNova and Avigen currently contemplate that the terms of the merger would provide that Avigen shareholders receive consideration approximating Avigen’s net cash liquidation value plus $3 million. Avigen shareholders would be able to elect to receive this consideration in cash at closing or to receive a convertible security by which that cash consideration may be converted into MediciNova stock at a conversion price equal to the greater of $4.00 or a mutually agreeable volume-weighted average price of MediciNova common stock. At the end of 18 months, any unexercised convertible securities would be paid out at their cash value. This would allow shareholders of both companies the opportunity to participate in the future value created by combining the companies’ product portfolios. In addition to the consideration above, all Avigen shareholders would receive a contingent payment right for a specific product program milestone payment associated with Avigen’s Assignment Agreement with Genzyme Corporation, potentially subject to certain adjustments.

Yuichi Iwaki, M.D., Ph.D., MediciNova’s President and Chief Executive Officer, said, “We are excited to announce this important step towards a potential acquisition of Avigen and believe that the proposed merger presents clear advantages for the shareholders of both companies, most notably, the ability to more fully take advantage of the opportunities that the ibudilast compound and analogs provide in a variety of indications and markets. We look forward to finalizing definitive documentation as expeditiously as possible and to presenting this transaction for shareholder approval in due course.”

“Avigen believes the proposed merger on the terms currently contemplated would be in the best interests of our shareholders and we intend to continue to negotiate with the goal of reaching agreement on all of the terms and presenting it to our shareholders for approval in the third quarter of 2009,” commented Andrew Sauter, Avigen’s Chief Executive Officer, President and Chief Financial Officer. “We believe that combining our ibudilast programs, AV411 and MN-166, would enhance the global development potential for the compound in a range of neurological indications, including Multiple Sclerosis, neuropathic pain and drug addiction.”

The understanding reached by the parties is nonbinding and subject to definitive documentation and due diligence. The closing of any proposed merger would also be subject to customary closing conditions, including required shareholder and regulatory approvals and the absence of material adverse changes. MediciNova and Avigen are not legally obligated to continue discussions regarding the proposed transaction on the terms described herein or on any other terms. No definitive agreements have been reached, and there can be no assurances that definitive agreements will be successfully negotiated, that the proposed terms will not be revised or that the proposed merger will be completed.

[Full Disclosure: We have a holding in AVGN. This is neither a recommendation to buy or sell any securities. All information provided believed to be reliable and presented for information purposes only. Do your own research before investing in any security.]

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Lamassu Holdings blasts DITC board

Posted in Activist Investors, Ditech Networks Inc (NASDAQ:DITC), Greenbackd Portfolio, Lamassu Holdings LLC, Lloyd I. Miller III, Net Cash Stocks, Stocks, tagged , , , , , on July 17, 2009| Leave a Comment »

Lamassu Holdings has blasted the board of Ditech Networks Inc (NASDAQ:DITC). In a letter to the board, Lamassu Holdngs accuses DITC management of “spending as though Ditech Networks has money to burn, adding to the amount of money you have already lost for shareholders during your tenure,” “aggressively [overstepping] the bounds of good corporate governance” and “clearly [violating] your fiduciary responsibility.”

We’ve been following DITC (see our archive here) because it is trading below its net cash value with an investor, Lamassu Holdings LLC, disclosing a 9.4% holding in November last year. Lamassu has previously offered to acquire DITC for $1.25 per share in cash. Lamassu says that it “anticipates its due diligence requirement will take no more than two weeks and there is no financing contingency.” Lamassu has now nominated two candidates for election to the board “who are committed to enhancing shareholder value through a review of the Company’s business and strategic direction.” Lloyd I Miller III has also disclosed a 5.9% holding and has come out in support of Mr. Leehealey and Mr. Sansone – the director candidates nominated by Lamassu Holdings for election to the board of directors at the DITC annual meeting – as “candidates who are independent of management and he seeks to encourage greater attention to corporate governance by all members of the Board of Directors.” The stock is up 44.9% from our initial $0.89 to close yesterday at $1.29, giving the company a market capitalization of $33.9M. We last estimated the net cash value at around $32.2M or $1.23 per share and the liquidation value at around $43.4M or $1.65 per share. While the deterioration in value is a concern, Mr. Miller’s support of Lamassu Holding’s director candidates introduces a new element to the position. We’re inclined to hold on to see how the annual meeting plays out.

The press release setting out the text of the letter from Lamassu Holdings is set out below (via Yahoo Finance):

NEWPORT BEACH, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Lamassu Holdings, LLC (“Lamassu”) has sent the following letter to the Board of Directors of Ditech Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ:DITC – News) (“Ditech Networks”) Members of the Board:

Over the past month a significant number of shareholders have either publicly, through filings, or privately rejected your leadership by expressing their support for Lamassu’s director nominees. Instead of listening to these shareholders and correcting your course, you push forward spending as though Ditech Networks has money to burn, adding to the amount of money you have already lost for shareholders during your tenure. Your recent decision to tie executive compensation to a level of investment associated with mStage/toktok, an unproven technology that to date has produced no revenues and has no immediate prospects, is outrageous and limits management’s ability to make the hard but intelligent decisions to reduce investment in that technology if its prospects for revenue continue to be elusive. With this measure we believe you have aggressively overstepped the bounds of good corporate governance and have clearly violated your fiduciary responsibility.

Investors in Ditech Networks (NASDAQ: DITC – News) are not venture capitalists and did not sign up for this type of speculative investing with such a large portion of the Company’s assets. Management needs to have the latitude to make the decisions that are appropriate given the revenue prospects of each product and the Board should ensure that no individual investment puts the Company in as much jeopardy of total failure as the mStage/toktok investment does.

In addition, given the level of support for Lamassu’s slate of director nominees, we remain completely perplexed by your apparent desire to engage in a pointless proxy fight and waste Company resources to protect your own interests. It is obvious shareholders will aggressively reject the idea of spending millions of dollars of their money in this manner when the addition of Lamassu’s nominees to the Board will clearly provide a much needed new perspective that is not steeped in the countless mistakes of the past or married to visions and dreams that produce little or nothing in the way of actual revenue.

For the sake of all investors we encourage you to radically alter your behavior and begin listening to shareholders as opposed to pursuing your own interests and extremely risky agendas. While you personally will not be significantly harmed if mStage/toktok is unsuccessful and Ditech Networks ultimately fails, many investors are not in a position to so casually lose their money.

Sincerely Lamassu Holdings, LLC

Hat tip to Toby.

[Full Disclosure:  We do not have a holding in DITC. This is neither a recommendation to buy or sell any securities. All information provided believed to be reliable and presented for information purposes only. Do your own research before investing in any security.]

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MATH announces merger; CEO resigns in protest; Greenbackd exits

Posted in Activist Investors, MathStar Inc (OTC:MATH), Net Cash Stocks, Net Net Stocks, S. Muoio & Co, Salvatore Muoio, Stocks, Zachary McAdoo, tagged , , , on July 16, 2009| 4 Comments »

MathStar Inc’s (OTC:MATH) board has announced a “possible merger” with a company called Sajan, Inc, presumably the private company discussed in the presentation at the annual meeting. Douglas M. Pihl, MATH’s CEO, has resigned in protest, saying in his resignation letter that he was resigning because of the board’s “rejection of the plan I have presented to restart MathStar based on Video Encoding technology.” Pihl goes on to say:

I do not believe the proposed Sajan acquisition is in the best interest of MathStar shareholders. I do not believe that Sajan, or the advisors hired to do the due diligence, have presented a business plan that warrants committing over $13 million of cash, nearly half of which will not remain in the combined company but will be distributed to the current Sajan shareholders. In addition the newly issued shares will result in nearly a 50% dilution of the equity currently held by MathStar shareholders.

The full text of Pihl’s letter is set out below. We tend to agree with Pihl’s assessment that the Sajan acquisition is a loser for MATH shareholders. On that basis, we’re out at yesterday’s close of $1.20. We initiated the position on December 17 last year at $0.68, which means we’re up 76.5% on an absolute basis. The S&P500 closed at 913.18 when we intiated the position, and closed yesterday at to close yesterday at 932.68, which means we’re up 74.3% on a relative basis.

Post mortem

We started following MATH in December last year (see our post archive here) because it was trading below its net cash value and had two substantial stockholders lobbying management to liquidate. MATH’s board had suspended the company’s operations and had been exploring “strategic alternatives, which could include merger, acquisition, increasing operations in another structure or liquidation.” Two activist investors, Mr. Zachary McAdoo of The Zanett Group and Mr. Salvatore Muoio of S. Muoio & Co., urged MATH’s board to consider liquidation rather than merger, but MATH’s management seem intent on a merger. The liquidation was presented to stockholders on Friday last week, and rejected. Tiberius Capital has a tender offer for MATH at $1.25 per share in cash expiring on July 20. We’ve elected to sell our stock on market rather than tender to Tiberius Capital because there’s no certainty that Tiberius Capital will be successful, and it’s time to get as far away from MATH’s management as humanly possible. While the position didn’t play out as we had hoped, we’re still satisfied with the result.

The company’s press release announcing the merger is set out below:

MathStar Announces Letter of Intent for Possible Merger;

Board Announces Special Committee

HILLSBORO, Ore., July 15, 2009 — MathStar, Inc. (MATH.PK) today announced that it has entered into a non-binding Letter of Intent with Sajan, Inc. regarding a potential merger. Sajan is a leading provider of language translation management solutions. Sajan’s language translation services use advanced process and quality management through their next generation SaaS technology. Sajan’s patent-pending data management and on-demand collaboration and workflow platform create a unique blend of technology and service, resulting in the most advanced and measurable solution available today. Among their clients are several Fortune 500 companies.

MathStar also announced that on July 14, 2009, the Board of Directors appointed a special committee consisting of MathStar’s independent directors, Richard C. Perkins and Benno G. Sand, to negotiate the completion of a definitive merger and ancillary agreements with Sajan. Craig-Hallum Capital Group, LLC is representing MathStar as its investment banker in connection with the proposed transaction.

The Mathstar Board, in conjunction with Craig-Hallum and several independent technology and financial consultants, has conducted extensive due diligence of Sajan; however, entry into definitive merger and ancillary agreements with Sajan is subject to the completion of due diligence, among other customary conditions. Final terms and conditions of the proposed transaction will be disclosed upon any signing of the definitive merger agreement.

Statements in this press release, other than historical information, may be “forward-looking” in nature within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and are subject to various risks, uncertainties and assumptions. These statements are based on management’s current expectations, estimates and projections about MathStar and include, but are not limited to, those set forth in the section of MathStar’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2008 filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on March 31, 2009 under the heading “Item 1A. Risk Factors” and in our Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended March 31, 2009. Except as may be required by law, MathStar undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements in order to reflect events or circumstances that may arise after the date of this release.

The CEO’s resignation letter is set out below:

July 14, 2009

Gentlemen;

In response to your decision today to pursue the Sajan acquisition I hereby tender my resignation as President, CEO and CFO of MathStar and also my position on the Board of Directors, effective immediately. I am disappointed by the actions you took regarding Sajan and by your rejection of the plan I have presented to restart MathStar based on Video Encoding technology.

Further, I do not believe the proposed Sajan acquisition is in the best interest of MathStar shareholders. I do not believe that Sajan, or the advisors hired to do the due diligence, have presented a business plan that warrants committing over $13 million of cash, nearly half of which will not remain in the combined company but will be distributed to the current Sajan shareholders. In addition the newly issued shares will result in nearly a 50% dilution of the equity currently held by MathStar shareholders.

Douglas M. Pihl

[Full Disclosure:  We do not have a holding in MATH. This is neither a recommendation to buy or sell any securities. All information provided believed to be reliable and presented for information purposes only. Do your own research before investing in any security.]

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NSTR pays initial distribution of $2.06

Posted in Activist Investors, Catalysts, Liquidation, Net Cash Stocks, Northstar Neuroscience Inc (NASDAQ:NSTR), Stocks, tagged , , on July 16, 2009| 8 Comments »

Northstar Neuroscience Inc (NASDAQ:NSTR) has paid an initial distribution of $2.06 per share.

We’ve been following NSTR (see our post archive here) because it was a net cash stock that had announced a plan to liquidate. We estimated that the final pay out figure in the liquidation would be around $59M or $2.26 per share, which presented an upside of around 18% from our initial $1.91 position. The company had estimated a slightly lower pay out figure of between $1.90 and $2.10 “assuming we are unable to sell our non-cash assets” and expected the initial distribution to be approximately $1.80 per share. The $2.06 distribution returns our initial capital and makes our profit since inception 7.9%, with further distributions to come.

From the relevant report:

As previously disclosed, on June 12, 2009 Northstar Neuroscience, Inc. (the “Company”) filed Articles of Dissolution (the “Articles of Dissolution”) with the Secretary of State of the State of Washington in accordance with the Company’s Plan of Complete Liquidation and Dissolution (the “Plan of Dissolution”). The Articles of Dissolution became effective, and the Company became a dissolved corporation under Washington law, on July 2, 2009 (the “Effective Date”) at 5:00 p.m. Pacific Time.

In addition, the Company’s common stock (the “Common Stock”) was officially delisted from the NASDAQ Global Market at the opening of trading on the Effective Date, pursuant to the previously filed Form 25, which the Company filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission and The NASDAQ Stock Market, Inc. on June 22, 2009. The Company has instructed its transfer agent to close the Company’s stock transfer records as of the close of business on the Effective Date and no longer to recognize or record any transfers of shares of the Common Stock after such date except by will, intestate succession or operation of law.

On July 13, 2009, pursuant to the Plan of Dissolution, the board of directors of the Company approved an initial liquidating distribution of $2.06 per share to the shareholders of record of the Common Stock as of the Effective Date. The Company expects to pay this initial liquidating distribution in cash on or about July 15, 2009.

Pursuant to the requirements of Washington law, the Company intends to retain certain of the remaining assets of the Company to satisfy and make reasonable provision for the satisfaction of any current, contingent or conditional claims and liabilities of the Company until such time as the Company’s board of directors determines that it is appropriate to distribute some or all of such remaining assets. The amount and timing of any subsequent and final distributions will be at the discretion of the Company’s board of directors.

(emphasis added)

[Full Disclosure:  We do not have a holding in NSTR. This is neither a recommendation to buy or sell any securities. All information provided believed to be reliable and presented for information purposes only. Do your own research before investing in any security.]

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MATH announces results of annual meeting; Shareholders reject liquidation

Posted in Activist Investors, MathStar Inc (OTC:MATH), Net Cash Stocks, S. Muoio & Co, Stocks, tagged , , , on July 15, 2009| 5 Comments »

MathStar Inc’s (OTC:MATH) board has announced the results of the annual meeting and, disappointingly, MATH’s stockholders have rejected the proposal to liquidate MATH.

We’ve been following MATH since December last year (see our post archive here) when it was trading at $0.68. The stock is up 73.5% to close yesterday at $1.18, giving it a market capitalization of $10.8M. We estimate MATH’s net cash value to be around $11.7M or $1.27 per share. The board’s estimate of the company’s liquidation value is slightly higher than ours, at $1.40 per share. Both estimates exclude revenue from any sales of MATH’s existing inventory of field programmable object array chips or its FPOA technology, although we have ascribed negligible value to these assets. We initiated the position because MATH was trading below its net cash value and had two substantial stockholders lobbying management to liquidate. MATH’s board has suspended the company’s operations and has been exploring “strategic alternatives, which could include merger, acquisition, increasing operations in another structure or liquidation.” Two activist investors, Mr. Zachary McAdoo of The Zanett Group and Mr. Salvatore Muoio of S. Muoio & Co., have been urging MATH’s board to consider liquidation rather than a merger. Tiberius Capital has also launched a tender offer for MATH at $1.25 per share in cash. MATH’s board has recommended against acceptance.

The company’s press release announcing the results is set out below:

MathStar Announces Results of Annual Meeting;

CEO Doug Pihl Announces Strategic Plan

HILLSBORO, Ore., July 13, 2009 — MathStar, Inc. (MATH.PK) today announced the results of its annual meeting of stockholders, held Friday, July 10, 2009 in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Three proposals were voted on at the meeting: (i) stockholders voted to re-elect the four nominated Directors of MathStar’s Board of Directors; (ii) stockholders ratified the appointment of MathStar’s independent registered public accounting firm, PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP; and (iii) as had been recommended by the Board, stockholders rejected the stockholder proposal recommending liquidation of MathStar.

After the vote tallies were announced, Doug Pihl, the Chairman, President and CEO of MathStar made a presentation regarding the strategic alternatives currently being explored by the Board, which include the possibility of a merger with a private company or a restart of MathStar upon the acquisition of certain video encoding technology.

Mr. Pihl said, “After the meeting, I am confident that our stockholders continue to support the vision of the MathStar Board and we are working hard to identify a business opportunity that leverages MathStar’s assets with the goal of growing revenues and enhancing shareholder value.”

As such, MathStar’s Board of Directors continues to recommend that MathStar stockholders reject the cash tender offer from Tiberius Capital II, LLC (Tiberius).

The MathStar Board of Directors continues to recommend AGAINST stockholders tendering their MathStar shares to Tiberius for several reasons, some of which include:

· MathStar stockholders voted to reject liquidation, signaling a continued confidence in the Board’s strategic vision;

· the myriad changes to the tender offer highlight that it continues to be inadequate and that MathStar stockholders are generally rejecting it;

· Tiberius’ offer still would eliminate the use of MathStar’s $140 million net operating loss carryforwards, which could shield taxes on more than $10 in earnings per share, if MathStar attains sufficient profitable operations in the future; and

· Tiberius still has not set forth any specific plans for the Company were it to acquire a controlling interest.

The Board’s reasons for recommending that you reject the Tiberius tender offer are explained in more detail in MathStar’s Solicitation/Recommendation Statement on Schedule 14D-9, as amended (MathStar Statement) filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). You may review and obtain copies of the MathStar Statement and all amendments thereto free of charge at the SEC’s website at http://www.sec.gov. You may also obtain copies of the MathStar Statement at http://www.mathstar.com or by contacting calling MathStar’s information agent, The Proxy Advisory Group, LLC, at (888) 337-7699 (888-33PROXY) and requesting a copy.

[Full Disclosure:  We do not have a holding in MATH. This is neither a recommendation to buy or sell any securities. All information provided believed to be reliable and presented for information purposes only. Do your own research before investing in any security.]

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MATH files 2008 annual meeting presentation to shareholders

Posted in Activist Investors, MathStar Inc (OTC:MATH), Net Cash Stocks, Stocks, tagged , , , on July 14, 2009| 4 Comments »

MathStar Inc’s (OTC:MATH) board has filed the slides from its presentation to shareholders at the 2008 annual meeting. In the presentation, MATH’s board discusses in some detail its rationale for recommending that stockholders reject Tiberius Capital’s $1.25 per share cash tender offer. We’ve unpacked the slide show below to see if we can arrive at a decision about Greenbackd’s position in MATH.

We’ve been following MATH since December last year (see our post archive here) when it was trading at $0.68. We initiated the position because MATH was trading below its net cash value and had two substantial stockholders lobbying management to liquidate. The stock is up 79.4% to close yesterday at $1.22, giving it a market capitalization of $11.2M. We estimate MATH’s net cash value to be around $11.7M or $1.27 per share. That value is predominantly cash and short term investments and doesn’t take into account any further value that the sale of the FPOA technology and intellectual property may yield. The board’s estimate of the company’s liquidation value is slightly higher than ours, at $1.40 per share. The board’s estimate also excludes revenue from any sales of the MATH’s existing inventory of field programmable object array chips or its FPOA technology.

Prior to Tiberius Capital’s offer, MATH had received several unsolicited merger proposals from PureChoice, Inc, all of which have been rejected by MATH. Two activist investors, Mr. Zachary McAdoo of The Zanett Group and Mr. Salvatore Muoio of S. Muoio & Co., have been urging MATH’s board to consider liquidation rather than a merger. MATH’s board has suspended the company’s operations and has been exploring “strategic alternatives, which could include merger, acquisition, increasing operations in another structure or liquidation.”

Tiberius Capital launched its tender offer for MATH on June 1 this year at $1.15 cash per share, bidding for 51% of the outstanding shares. Robert T. Sullivan, one of the principals of Tiberius said in the press release announcing the initial offer:

We are making the tender offer to enhance shareholder value. The potential strategies that we may cause MathStar to pursue include a partial repurchase of Shares, an extraordinary dividend, liquidation, selling or licensing MathStar’s technology assets, a business re-start in which MathStar would hire new personnel to improve and commercially exploit its technology assets, and/or a merger or other business combination. We will use the balance of 2009 to carefully examine whether to re-start MathStar’s business and/or to identify a suitable merger partner.

Tiberius Capital has since increased its offer to$1.25 per share in cash. MATH’s board continues to recommend against acceptance. The board’s presentation to the annual meeting discusses in some detail the board’s rationale for recommending against Tiberius’ offer, and the other possibilities for MATH.

The Annual Meeting Presentation

MATH’s board values MATH as follows:

  • $1.40 per share in cash; plus
  • NOLs (which could shelter up to $10 per share in future earnings (if any)); plus
  • MATH’s FPOA intellectual property; plus
  • MATH’s status as a public company:

MATH Presentation Slide 1MATH has been reviewing other “business combination opportunities,” presumably in an effort to capture the additional value beyond MATH’s cash (i.e. the value of the NOLs, other IP and status as a public company).  All have been rejected “primarily on the basis of valuation, excessive risk to upside, or excessive risk to our cash position.”

The presentation sets out what MATH seeks in a merger partner:

MATH Presentation Slide 2

MATH is presently conducting “deep due diligence” on two possible business opportunities, the first a private company “that could proactively use a portion of MathStar’s cash” and the second “a possible restart involving video encoding technology, which we could acquire and commercialize.”

The first opportunity – the private company – has annual revenues “over $10M.” The terms for the deal with the private company are as follows:

MATH Presentation Slide 3The second opportunity – the restart – seems to be technology only, with no established revenue. Says MATH, “We would plan to build a sustainable profitable revenue stream derived from sales of software solutions, board-level solutions and, eventually, chip solutions.” The terms for the restart deal are as follows:

MATH Presentation Slide 4The final material slide sets out MATH’s board’s plan for 2009:

MATH Presentation Slide 5

Conclusion

MATH’s board’s view boils down to this: Tiberius Capital’s $1.25 per share offer should be rejected because it is lower than the board’s $1.40 per share estimate of MATH’s liquidation value, which value also excludes the value of the MATH’s NOLs (which could shelter up to $10 per share in future earnings (if any)), the value of MATH’s FPOA intellectual property and the value of MATH’s status as a public company. In MATH’s board’s view, the better options for MATH are the two business opportunities. Let’s consider those now:

The first deal – the private company – makes use of MATH’s status as a public company and makes capturing the value of the NOLs a possibility. From that perspective, it’s a commendable deal. On the downside, we do not know if the new combined entity will generate any net income to make use of the NOLs. We do know that MATH’s existing shareholders will be diluted down from owning 100% of MATH’s cash to approximately 50% of MATH’s cash and 50% of a unknown private company generating annual revenues of “over $10M,” although there is  no word on the profitability of the private company.

The second deal is harder to value. With no revenue history, the restart technology-only deal is a crapshoot. It seems quite conceivable to us that MATH spends a large portion of its cash on the technology and then spends the rest on commercializing it, never generating any revenue, let alone net income.

Our own estimate of MATH’s value is considerably more conservative than MATH’s board’s view. We ascribe minimal value to MATH’s FPOA technology and status as a public company. The NOLs certainly have value, but we question how successful MATH can be in harnessing that value given the regulations around preserving them. We also believe it will be extremely difficult for MATH to find a worthwhile merger partner, and the length of time MATH has taken in its search seems to bear out this view. MATH needs 50%+ of the combined entity and has only limited cash, which means either a tiny merger partner or an acquisition of technology with no revenue – lo and behold, those are the two options on the table. The second deal – the restart – is a non starter. We’ll take cash over commercially unproven, pre-revenue technology any day. The first deal – the private company – is better than the second, but not by much. It still doesn’t meet Greenbackd’s threshold for a deal, which is the exchanging of a known quantity of cash for unknown earnings. Long term readers of this site will recognize that our vast preference for cash over unknown future earnings means that we will almost always lean away from deals of this stripe.

So where does that leave our position in MATH? Our estimate of MATH’s liquidation value is its net cash value after deducting around $2M of cash burn, professional fees and other liquidation costs, or around $11.7M or $1.27 per share. If a near-term liquidation was a real possibility, our estimate of the liquidation value would be closer to the board’s view of $1.40 per share. Given the foregoing presentation by the board, we don’t believe that liquidation is likely in the near-term or at all. It seems much more likely that the board will undertake one of the two business opportunities outlined above, and we don’t believe either is likely to increase the value of our stake in MATH with any certainty. Accordingly, we’re going to consider our ongoing position in MATH in light of the results of the annual meeting. More tomorrow.

[Full Disclosure:  We do not have a holding in MATH. This is neither a recommendation to buy or sell any securities. All information provided believed to be reliable and presented for information purposes only. Do your own research before investing in any security.]

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