Two Shaw family members remain on the board. Shaw Communications sold its Class B shares in 2019 (at a level about 5X the current price) but the multi-voting controlling shares remain and several Shaw family members also own shares directly (in the 2% range each). We do not have the actual percentage of votes owned, however, after searching through Sedar. One fund, FIL Ltd., owns 9%. Dimensional Fund owns 4% but there are no other major shareholders. The issues here are debt (very high) and lack of growth. Per share earnings have gone from $1.57 to an expected $0.21 next year, as the industry changed. Debt of $1.2B is 9X cash flow. Either debt needs to go down or earnings need to improve, two things that are hard to see happening. An outright sale of the company is also difficult because of CRTC rules. The dividend was cut in half in March 2023 and we do not think that will be the first cut. With its small size, weak performance (down 56% in a year) and issues noted above, there is almost nothing of interest here.
5i Research Answer: