Category: Issue Comments

Algonquin Power and Utilities Corp. has announced:

the closing of the previously announced offering of Cumulative Rate Reset Preferred Shares, Series A (the “Series A Shares”). Algonquin issued a total of 4,800,000 Series A Shares at $25 per share for aggregate gross proceeds of $120 million. For the initial period ending December 31, 2018, holders of Series A Shares are entitled to receive a cumulative quarterly fixed dividend of $1.1250 per share per annum (4.5% on the subscription price of $25 per share), as and when declared by the board of directors of the Corporation.

The offering was made on a bought deal basis through a syndicate of underwriters led by Scotiabank and TD Securities Inc., and included BMO Capital Markets, CIBC World Markets Inc., Desjardins Securities Inc., National Bank Financial Inc., RBC Capital Markets, Canaccord Genuity Corp., Cormark Securities Inc. and Raymond James Ltd.

The Series A Shares will commence trading on the Toronto Stock Exchange today under the symbol AQN.PR.A.

The net proceeds of the offering will be used to fund a portion of Algonquin’s investment in two wind farms (Minonk and Senate) in the United States and for general corporate purposes.

AQN.PR.A is a FixedReset, 4.50%+294, announced October 25. The issue will be tracked by HIMIPref™, but relegated to the Scraps index on credit concerns.

The issue traded 302,554 shares today in a range of 24.98-10 before closing at 24.96-99, 3×7. Vital statistics are:

NA.PR.Q, the FixedReset 3.80%+243 announced October 30 settled today.

The prospectus, dated October 31 and available on SEDAR, is noteworthy for its hopeless misunderstanding of the NVCC rules:

Under the new Basel III rules, effective January 1, 2013, all non-common Tier 1 and Tier 2 capital instruments issued by a bank must have, either in their contractual terms and conditions or by way of statute in the issuer’s home country, a clause requiring a full and permanent conversion into common shares of such bank upon certain trigger events at the point where such bank is determined to be no longer viable. The First Preferred Shares Series 28 and, if and when issued, the First Preferred Shares Series 29 as a result will not qualify as non-common Tier 1 capital under the new capital rules as no such conversion mechanism exists. For purposes of being included in the Bank’s regulatory capital under the new capital rules, the First Preferred Shares Series 28 and the First Preferred Shares Series 29 would be phased out beginning January 31, 2013 (their recognition will be capped at 90% of total Tier 1 capital from January 1, 2013, with the cap reducing by 10% in each subsequent year). As a result, the Bank may, with the prior approval of the Superintendent, redeem the First Preferred Shares Series 28 and the First Preferred Shares Series 29, if any, in accordance with their respective terms.

In fact, the cap for inclusion of non-NVCC Tier 1 will be set according to the amount outstanding at the end of this year. 100 percent of this total may be included in Tier 1 in 2013; 90% in 2014; and so on. The decline is by total non-NVCC, not by issue, so some banks may have entire issues included in Tier 1 by the time we get to the end of the schedule, as long as those issues are less than 10% of what they have outstanding at year-end.

However, such details did not hurt sales – TMX Money advises that there are 8-million shares outstanding, so we may conclude that the greenshoe option for a million shares was exercised in full.

In accordance with my policy with respect to non-NVCC issues of regulated financial institutions, I have added a maturity entry to the option schedule used for analytical purposes by my software, HIMIPref™; this instrument is analyzed with a call option at par on 2017-11-15 (as stated in the prospectus) and a maturity 2022-1-31 (a totally synthetic entry designed to reflect the likelihood of a call). I am all too well aware that the instrument will not, in fact, mature on 2022-1-31: for this and other instruments I will simply cross my fingers and hope that the situation clarifies in the next five years (it could be called; shareholders could vote to change the terms); if not then I will decide what to do when I change the terms of the issue in 2017 to reflect the reset dividend rate.

Also in accordance with my standard practice, this issue is being assigned to the FixedResets index, lumped together with all the non-financial issues for which NVCC is not applicable; I have not (yet) considered that the differences are significant enough for FixedResets to warrant the creation of a new index, as I did with DeemedRetractibles.

I really hate this mess. Thank you OSFI!

NA.PR.Q traded 1,663,080 shares today in a range of 25.27-42 before closing at 25.39-42, 100×6. Vital statistics are:

Scotia Managed Companies has announced:

The Board of Directors of allBanc Split Corp. (the “Company”) announced today it has approved a proposal to reorganize the Company. The reorganization will permit holders of Capital Shares to extend their investment in the Company beyond the scheduled redemption date of March 8, 2013 for an additional five years. The Preferred Shares will be redeemed on the same terms originally contemplated in their share provisions on March 8, 2013. Holders of Capital Shares who do not wish to extend their investment and all holders of Preferred Shares will have their shares redeemed on March 8, 2013.

The reorganization will involve (i) the extension of the originally scheduled redemption date, (ii) a special retraction right to enable holders of Capital Shares to retract their shares as originally contemplated should they not wish to extend their investment and (iii) the issuance of a new class of preferred shares in order to provide continuing leverage for the Capital Shares. The Company may also offer additional Capital Shares at the time of the preferred share offering.

A special meeting of holders of the Capital Shares will be held on December 13, 2012 to consider and vote upon the proposed reorganization. Details of the proposed reorganization will be outlined in an information circular to be prepared and delivered to holders of Capital Shares of record on November 9, 2012 in connection with the special meeting and will be available on www.sedar.com. Implementation of the proposed reorganization will also be subject to applicable regulatory approval including the Toronto Stock Exchange.

allBanc Split Corp. is a mutual fund corporation created to hold a portfolio of common shares of the Bank of Montreal, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, The Bank of Nova Scotia, Royal Bank of Canada and The Toronto Dominion Bank. Capital Shares and Preferred Shares of allBanc Split Corp. are listed for trading on the Toronto Stock Exchange under the symbols ABK.A and ABK.PR.B respectively.

ABK.PR.B is a fairly small issue, with less than a million shares outstanding with a par value of $26.75 each. It is scheduled for redemption 2013-3-8.

ABK.PR.B was last mentioned on PrefBlog when they retained their advisor for this transaction. ABK.PR.B is not tracked by HIMIPref™.

Moody’s Investors Service has announced that it:

has placed the long-term ratings of six Canadian banks (including the bank financial strength ratings, all senior debt, junior subordinated debt, and preferred stock ratings) on review for downgrade.
…
Following the review, the senior debt and deposit ratings for the six banks are expected to generally be no more than one notch lower than today.

During this review Moody’s will also consider the removal of systemic support from the ratings of all seven Canadian banks’ subordinated debt instruments that benefit from support. It is our view that the global trend towards imposing losses on junior creditors in the context of future bank resolutions may reduce the predictability of such support being provided to the sub-debt holders of the large Canadian banks. We currently incorporate two notches of systemic support into the subordinated debt ratings of the six banks outlined above as well as in Royal Bank of Canada (RBC; Aa3 Stable (m); C+/a2 Stable). All RBC ratings were affirmed (as they were addressed by our rating actions on Firms with Global Capital Markets Operations in June 2012) except for its supported subordinated debt ratings that have been placed on review for downgrade.
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High levels of consumer indebtedness and elevated housing prices leave Canadian banks more vulnerable to downside risks to the Canadian economy than in the past. By the second quarter of 2012, Canadian household debt to personal disposable income reached a record 163%, up from 137% in the second quarter of 2007, reflecting growth in debt that significantly outpaced personal incomes. Growth in consumer debt has been driven by rising house prices, which have increased by 21% since August 2007 (Source: Teranet-National Bank House Price Index).

Moody’s central scenario for Canada’s gross domestic product (GDP) is to grow between 2% and 3% in 2013, but downside risks have increased. The open, commodity-oriented economy is exposed to external risks, primarily (i) the weak US economic recovery (ii) the ongoing sovereign and banking crisis in the euro area; and (iii) a slowdown in emerging markets which weighs on commodity prices. Should these risks materialize, they would have significant ramifications for the Canadian economy that would be transmitted into the banking system.

Additionally, the large Canadian banks’ noteworthy reliance on confidence-sensitive wholesale funding, which is obscured by limited public disclosure, increases their vulnerability to financial markets turmoil.

In addition to the macro-economic factors cited above, National Bank of Canada, Bank of Montreal, Bank of Nova Scotia and Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce have sizable exposure to volatile capital markets businesses. Moody’s believes that trading and investment banking activities expose financial firms to the risk of outsized losses and risk management and controls challenges, and leave them highly dependent on the confidence of investors, customers and counterparties.

Toronto Dominion and Caisse Centrale Desjardins have other idiosyncratic factors that are additive to the macro-economic risks. Toronto Dominion’s exceptionally robust creditworthiness may be weakened by the increasing contribution of its less-strong US subsidiary…

There has been lots of handwringing and crocodile tears from Lapdog Carney regarding Canadian consumer debt recently:

Mr. Carney also said the risk posed by household debt might be dissipating as the Bank of Canada’s repeated warnings sink in.

… and – after the water has been tested – from his boss:

Finance Minister Jim Flaherty has also made this a crusade as the ratio of household debt to disposable income holds at record levels, and is expected to rise further.

… but the most obvious way to address the problem is though the other group of highly politicized financial lackeys. Unfortunately, however, there has been nothing – absolutely nothing – from OSFI on the subject.

The problem is that reducing interest rates has not had as great an effect on business spending as might have been hoped, but there has been a large effect on consumer spending; that is, low rates have not been used to buy capital goods so much as they have been to finance consumption (and I believe that while there is an element of “capital goods” in houses, there is also a large component of “consumption”, an effect that can be captured through such concepts as “owner equivalent rents” or, perhaps the price to rent ratio)

Monetary policy is a very blunt instrument and Spend-every-penny has been gleefully exploiting this weakness to indulge in micro-management of the mortgage market and – at last, this part is actually good, if long overdue – throttling back on the money he’s been using to inflate a housing bubble.

This possible downgrade serves as a great argument in favour of countercyclical capital buffers. This is much more general than the micro-management indulged in so far, because, if properly designed, it is irrelevant whether consumers are over-borrowing for houses or tulip bulbs. Trouble is, this might require OSFI to spend some time actually thinking about what it’s doing, so I don’t think we’ll see it any time soon.

Issues affect by the possible downgrade are (deep breath):
BMO.PR.H, BMO.PR.J, BMO.PR.K, BMO.PR.L, BMO.PR.M, BMO.PR.N, BMO.PR.O, BMO.PR.P, BMO.PR.Q
BNS.PR.J, BNS.PR.K, BNS.PR.L, BNS.PR.M, BNS.PR.N, BNS.PR.O, BNS.PR.P, BNS.PR.Q, BNS.PR.R, BNS.PR.T, BNS.PR.X, BNS.PR.Y, BNS.PR.Z
CM.PR.D, CM.PR.E, CM.PR.G, CM.PR.K, CM.PR.L, CM.PR.M, CM.PR.P
NA.PR.K, NA.PR.L, NA.PR.M, NA.PR.N, NA.PR.O, NA.PR.P
TD.PR.A, TD.PR.C, TD.PR.E, TD.PR.G, TD.PR.I, TD.PR.K, TD.PR.O, TD.PR.P, TD.PR.Q, TD.PR.R, TD.PR.S, TD.PR.Y

DBRS has announced that it:

has today downgraded the rating of the Preferred Shares issued by Brompton Lifeco Split Corp. (the Company) to Pfd-5 (high) from Pfd-4 (low).

In April 2007, the Company issued 3.1 million Preferred Shares (at $10 each), along with an equal number of Class A Shares (at $15 each). The termination date for both classes of shares issued is April 30, 2014.

Not the best timing ever to start a lifeco SplitShare Corporation!

On March 20, 2012, DBRS downgraded the ratings of the Preferred Shares to Pfd-4 (low) from Pfd-4 (high), due to the considerable drop in downside protection available to holders of the Preferred Shares. Since the rating downgrade, the NAV of the Company has been volatile, causing downside protection to fluctuate widely between -4.9% and 18.3%. The downside protection available to the Preferred Shares was 8.2% as of October 11, 2012, and the current Preferred Shares distribution coverage ratio is approximately 0.7 times. As a result of the downside protection falling and remaining below acceptable levels for a prolonged period, along with the insufficient distribution coverage ratio on the Portfolio, the rating has been further downgraded to Pfd-5 (high).

LCS.PR.A was last mentioned on PrefBlog when it was downgraded to Pfd-4(low) by DBRS. LCS.PR.A is not tracked by HIMIPref™ – not only is the Asset Coverage very low, but there are less than 2-million units outstanding.

Strathbridge Asset Management has announced (but not yet on the fund’s website):

Premium Income Corporation (the “Fund”) is pleased to announce that it has filed a preliminary short form prospectus relating to an offering of rights (“Rights”) to holders (“Shareholders”) of its class A shares (“Class A Shares”) and preferred shares (“Preferred Shares”). Each Shareholder of record on a date to be established prior to filing the final short form prospectus will receive one Right for each Class A or Preferred Share held.

Two Rights will entitle the holder to acquire one Class A Share and one Preferred Share upon payment of the subscription price. The record date and the subscription price will be determined at the time the Fund files its final prospectus for the offering.

The exercise of Rights by holders will provide the Fund with additional capital that can be used to take advantage of attractive investment opportunities and is also expected to increase the trading liquidity of the Class A Shares and the Preferred Shares as well as reduce the management expense ratio of the Fund.

The Fund invests in a portfolio consisting principally of common shares of Bank of Montreal, The Bank of Nova Scotia, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, Royal Bank of Canada and The Toronto-Dominion Bank (the “Banks”). To generate additional returns above the dividend income earned on the Fund’s portfolio, the Fund may from time to time write covered call options in respect of some or all of the common shares in the Fund’s portfolio. The Fund may also, from time to time, write cash-covered put options in respect of securities in which the Fund is permitted to invest. The manager and investment manager of the Fund is Strathbridge Asset Management Inc.

It’s very interesting that they will be giving rights to the preferred shareholders as well.

DBRS has announced that it:

notes the trend change of Brookfield Office Properties Inc. (BOP) to Negative from Stable on October 18, 2012. DBRS has indicated in the past that rating changes at Brookfield Asset Management Inc.’s (BAM) major subsidiaries could have rating implications for BAM at the corporate level. DBRS is also of the view that BAM’s overall credit profile has weakened within its current rating category in recent years as a result of fluctuating cash flows from its opportunistic investments and increased leverage at the corporate level.

With this, there remains minimal room for further deterioration, as indicated in our most recent report on BAM, published on April 24, 2012. As such, DBRS believes that BAM’s current ratings could come under pressure due to: (1) a material deterioration or rating downgrade in one or more of the core businesses (including BOP); (2) corporate-level financial metrics for 2012 fall short of our targets (funds from operation (FFO)-to-debt of 30% or higher and FFO interest coverage of 5.0 times); or (3) a material increase in the proportion of BAM’s invested capital in less-stable opportunistic investments.

DBRS will continue to monitor BAM’s performance to determine whether one or more of any of these issues brings sufficient pressure to warrant a trend change or other rating action.

The Negative Trend on Brookfield Office Properties was announced on October 18 and reported on PrefBlog.

Brookfield Asset Management is the proud issuer of:

• FixedResets BAM.PF.A, BAM.PF.B, BAM.PR.P, BAM.PR.R, BAM.PR.T, BAM.PR.X, BAM.PR.Z
• Floaters BAM.PR.B, BAM.PR.C, BAM.PR.K
• RatchetRate BAM.PR.E
• FixedFloater BAM.PR.G
• OperatingRetractible BAM.PR.J, BAM.PR.O
• Straight Perpetual BAM.PR.M, BAM.PR.N

A downgrade of BAM would also have an immediate effect on the SplitShares issued by BAM Split Corp.: BNA.PR.B, BNA.PR.C, BNA.PR.D and BNA.PR.E

DBRS’ increasing discomfort with the rating on BAM has been reported on PrefBlog in several posts: BAM To Slow Balance Sheet Deterioration and DBRS: BAM is Not-Quite-Trend-Negative. S&P assigned Outlook Negative to BAM last spring, and Outlook Negative to BPO in the summer.

DBRS has announced that it:

has today confirmed the ratings of Brookfield Office Properties Inc. (Brookfield or the Company) at BBB (high) and Pfd-3 (high), changing the trend to Negative from Stable. The trend change reflects DBRS’s concern that Brookfield’s coverage ratios will remain at levels that are inconsistent with the current rating category, particularly in light of the slower-than-expected progress in re-leasing space at the World Financial Center (WFC) in New York City.

DBRS had previously expected Brookfield’s coverage ratios to show meaningful improvement by the end of 2012 or early 2013. DBRS now believes it will take longer to re-lease the upcoming vacancy at the WFC to new tenants. As a result, DBRS expects that operating income from this space may not stabilize until the latter part of 2014 or in early 2015. In addition, DBRS believes the Company’s U.S. markets will likely remain challenged by high unemployment rates and slow, uneven economic growth. As a result, material improvement in coverage ratios over the near to medium term will, in DBRS’s opinion, be difficult for the Company to achieve. Lack of improvement in coverage ratios due to weakening operating performance and/or more aggressive financial management would likely result in a downgrade in the near term. The pressure on Brookfield’s ratings could be relieved if the Company took meaningful steps to strengthen its financial profile by lowering debt levels and improving its EBITDA interest coverage ratio back to levels above 2.00 times.
…
Despite challenging economic conditions, particularly in the United States, DBRS expects Brookfield’s high-quality office properties in high barrier-to-entry markets and in-place average rental rates that are currently below average market rental rates to provide underlying support to cash flow stability going forward. In terms of financial flexibility, Brookfield has sufficient liquidity and sources of capital (including proceeds from a further sell-down of the Company’s interest in Brookfield Canada Office Properties and potential non-core asset sales in the range of $200 million to $250 million) to fund upcoming commitments.

Brookfield Office Properties is the proud issuer of:

• OperatingRetractibles BPO.PR.F, BPO.PR.H, BPO.PR.J, BPO.PR.K
• FixedResets BPO.PR.L, BPO.PR.N, BPO.PR.P, BPO.PR.R and BPO.PR.T

DBRS has announced that it:

has today upgraded the rating of the Class C Preferred Shares, Series 1 (the Class C Preferred Shares) issued by TD Split Inc. (the Company) to Pfd-2 from Pfd-2 (low).
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On November 21, 2011, DBRS confirmed the ratings on the Class C Preferred Shares at Pfd-2 (low) mainly based on the stable downside protection levels available to holders of the Class C Preferred Shares over the prior year. Since the rating confirmation, the net asset value (NAV) of the Company has been increasing fairly steadily, rising from $25.93 on December 1, 2011, to $29.41 as of October 11, 2012. Downside protection available to the holders of the Class C Preferred Shares increased to approximately 66.0% as of October 11, 2012, from 61.4% on December 1, 2011. In addition, TD raised its dividends on August 30, 2012, increasing quarterly distributions by five cents to 77 cents per share. This dividend boost increases the Class C Preferred Share distribution coverage ratio to 2.0 times. The Class C Preferred Shares are being upgraded mainly due to the increased downside protection available and the improved distribution coverage ratio.

The main constraints to the rating are the following:

(1) The downside protection provided to holders of the Class C Preferred Shares is dependent on the value of the shares in the Portfolio.

(2) Volatility of price and changes in the dividend policies of TD may result in significant reductions in downside protection or dividend coverage from time to time.

(3) The concentration of the entire Portfolio is in the common shares of TD.

TDS.PR.C is tracked by HIMIPref™ but is relegated to the Scraps index on volume concerns. It was last mentioned on PrefBlog when there was a partial call for redemption last November.

LB.PR.F is a FixedReset, 4.00%+260, announced October 11. This issue will be tracked by HIMIPref™ but relegated to Scraps on credit concerns.

The prospectus supplement (SEDAR, October 11, 2012) contains some interesting wrinkles on the Non-Viability Contingent Capital (NVCC) theme:

Under the new Basel III rules, effective January 1, 2013, all non-common Tier 1 and Tier 2 capital instruments issued by a bank must have, either in their contractual terms and conditions or by way of statute in the issuer’s home country, a clause requiring a full and permanent conversion into common shares of such bank upon certain trigger events at the point where such bank is determined to be no longer viable. The Preferred Shares Series 11 as a result will not qualify as non-common Tier 1 capital under the new capital rules as no such conversion mechanism exists. As a result, the Bank may, with the prior approval of the Superintendent, redeem the Preferred Shares Series 11 in accordance with their terms. See “Risk Factors”.
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The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision has announced new international bank capital adequacy rules (commonly called Basel III) which will amend the existing Basel II capital management framework. The Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions of Canada (“OSFI”) has announced that it plans to adopt the new Basel III rules for purposes of Canadian bank capital guidelines. Under the new Basel III rules, effective January 1, 2013, all non-common Tier 1 and Tier 2 capital instruments issued by a bank must have, either in their contractual terms and conditions or by way of statute in the issuer’s home country, a clause requiring a full and permanent conversion into common shares of such bank upon certain trigger events at the point where such bank is determined to be no longer viable. The Preferred Shares Series 11 and, if and when issued, the Preferred Shares Series 12 as a result will not qualify as non-common Tier 1 capital under the new capital rules as no such conversion mechanism exists. For purposes of being included in the Bank’s regulatory capital under the new capital rules, the Preferred Shares Series 11 and the Preferred Shares Series 12 would be phased out beginning January 31, 2013 (their recognition will be capped at 90% of total Tier 1 capital from January 1, 2013, with the cap reducing by 10% in each subsequent year). As a result, the Bank may, with the prior approval of the Superintendent, redeem the Preferred Shares Series 11 and the Preferred Shares Series 12, if any, in accordance with their respective terms. If prevailing rates are lower at the time of redemption, a purchaser would not be able to reinvest the redemption proceeds in a comparable security at an effective yield as high as the yields on the Preferred Shares Series 11 or the Preferred Shares Series 12 being redeemed. The Bank’s redemption right may also adversely impact a purchaser’s ability to sell Preferred Shares Series 11 and Preferred Shares Series 12 as the optional redemption date or period approaches.

The 2011 Annual Report (complete with slogan “Our team – It’s (sic) Capital” on the front cover) states:

The BCBS published further details in January 2011 with regard to qualifying criteria for capital under the guidelines. OSFI subsequently provided additional guidance regarding the treatment of non-qualifying capital instruments in February 2011. As a result, certain capital instruments will no longer qualify fully as capital beginning January 1, 2013. The Bank’s
non-common capital instruments will be considered non-qualifying capital instruments under Basel III and will therefore be subject to a 10% phase-out per year beginning in 2013. These non-common capital instruments include both Series 9 and 10 preferred shares and Series 2010-1 subordinated Medium Term Notes. The Bank has not issued any hybrids or innovative Tier 1 instruments and none of its capital instruments are subject to a regulatory event redemption clause. Therefore, no regulatory event redemption is expected.

What are the Series 2010-1 sub MTNs? I’m glad you asked that:

On November 2, 2010, the Bank issued $250.0 million Series 2010-1 Medium Term Notes (Subordinated Indebtedness), for net proceeds of $248.4 million. The contractual maturity of the Series 2010-1 Medium Term Notes is November 2, 2020. Holders of the Series 2010-1 Medium Term Notes are entitled to receive semi-annually fixed interest payments for the initial five-year period ending November 2, 2015 at a rate of 3.70% per annum. The interest rate on the Series 2010-1 Medium Term Notes will reset on November 2, 2015 at the three-month bankers’ acceptance rate plus 1.76% per annum. The Series 2010-1 Medium Term Notes will not be redeemable prior to November 2, 2015. Subject to the provisions of the Bank Act, to the prior consent of OSFI and to the provisions described in the pricing supplement dated October 25, 2010, at any time on or after November 2, 2015, the Bank may redeem all or any part of the then outstanding Series 2010-1 Medium Term Notes, at the Bank’s option, by the payment of an amount in cash equal to the par value together with unpaid accrued interest. The $250.0 million Series 2010-1 Medium Term Notes are presented net of unamortized issue costs of $1.6 million on the consolidated balance sheet and include a net fair value adjustment of $5.9 million to reflect the change in the carrying value previously covered by a fair value hedge.

The Series 9 preferreds, LB.PR.D, pay 6% while Series 10, LB.PR.E, pay 5.25%. Both are Straight Perpetuals.

All this leaves me feeling a bit confused as to why this issue has been left without an NVCC clause. My first thought was that they had some capital instruments outstanding with such an absurdly low coupon that the company wanted to keep them outstanding for as long as possible; issuing these shares to be outstanding when the base for the sliding scale of Tier 1 eligibility is set could have helped such an effort. But this is not the case! Their non-common Tier 1 is actually a little bit expensive; if anything, I would have thought they’d issue NVCC shares to fund the redemption of LB.PR.D.

I just don’t get it. Any suggestions will be welcome. I stand ready to be corrected once the day comes, but I don’t think that a bank NVCC preferred will cost much more than a non-NVCC preferred; we Canadian know that not one of our banks will fail, because the government won’t let it happen.

Anyway, given the absence of an NVCC clause, I have put a DeemedMaturity entry into the call schedule, at 25.00 for 2022-1-31.

The issue traded 438,529 shares today in an unusually wide range of 25.18-65 before closing at 25.30-32, 5×28. Vital statistics are: