On September 24, I mentioned bank account promotions in which depositors effectively received a lottery ticket for making a deposit – this is similar to premium bonds in the UK, but not government-backed. My attention has now been drawn to a more savory alternative:
VISIT an outlet of Chilango, a Mexican food chain in London, and you will be invited to “become part of the story”, not just by eating a burrito but by buying a “burrito bond”. These are four-year loans to the firm of at least £500 ($835), paying annual interest of 8%, along with a variable number of free burritos, depending on how much an individual lends. Helped by Crowdcube, a crowdfunding website, Chilango has already raised £1.8m in this way—80% more than its initial goal—from 585 bond-buyers.
In Britain “mini-bonds” are more loans than bonds, in that they are not tradable (elsewhere they are a less regulated version of conventional bonds). They let individuals lend money directly to small, unlisted businesses. They tend to pay well, albeit with lots of risks and quirks.
We’ll never get that here in Canada. Small, unlisted businesses don’t employ ex-regulators and are therefore beyond the Pale.
There may have been a a little progress made in the battle against bank hegemony:
The Canadian Securities Administrators (the CSA) recently announced that the operation of the CSA National Systems (SEDAR, SEDI and NRD) has been transferred as of January 13, 2014 from CDS INC. to CGI Information Systems and Management Consultants Inc. (CGI).
As a result, CDS INC. (through its affiliate CDS Innovations Inc.) is no longer the exclusive provider of SEDAR data feeds. The CSA will now become the direct provider of these data services to subscribers and data resellers. The services consist of the provision of Canadian public company data filed on SEDAR as well as investment fund data filings. The data is delivered in near real-time (i.e., shortly after the time when made publically available in SEDAR), and includes the original PDF formatted filing, a text conversion of the filed document, and a control file indicating changes in the status of filed information.
Customization of information content received (for example, filtering to receive only certain documents) will continue to be available.
Going forward, these SEDAR data services will be offered directly by the Alberta Securities Commission (ASC), in its capacity as the representative securities regulatory authority authorized to grant licenses and enter into agreements with third parties relating to the use of SEDAR data. SEDAR data services can also be obtained from value-added resellers who have been authorized by the ASC to provide the services.
In addition, data feeds of SEDI data or an organization’s NRD data are no longer delivered by CDS INC. or its affiliate CDS Innovations Inc. These services are now offered directly by the ASC, again in its capacity within the CSA as the representative securities regulatory authority authorized to grant licenses and enter into agreements with third parties relating to the use of SEDI data or NRD data.
SEDI data services consist of providing publicly available information on filings, holdings and transactions by insiders of Canadian public companies who are required to report such trades in SEDI. The SEDI system contains information on almost 50,000 insiders and 6,400 issuers, and averages 20,000 insider reports per month.
A registered firm may subscribe to NRD data services to receive a regular feed of its organization’s registered individuals and registration categories.
Should you have interest in or questions about the services noted above, or wish to become a value added reseller, please contact the CSA IT Systems Office at data-distribution-services@csa-acvm.ca
Regrettably, however, this public information is still not public:
Except as otherwise set out in these Terms of Use or unless you have a written agreement in effect with the ASC which states otherwise, you may only provide a hypertext link to this Web Site on another web site, provided that (a) the link is a text-only link clearly marked “SEDAR Home Page”; (b) the user must be linked directly to the URL http://www.sedar.com and not to any other pages within this Web Site; …
Huh. I’ll be writing the ASC and asking for permission to link to the secret public documents. Any bets on my success?
Assiduous Reader MP sends me a link – unlike youse other bums, who never send me NUTHIN’ – to the page for Andrew McCreath’s BNN show, which includes links to two interviews with Nicolas Normandeau, PM of HPR. The first is a competently performed exposition of preferred share basics, the second has a moment of interest when Mr. Normandeau explains his liking for bank-issued DeemedRetractibles. He also doesn’t like FixedResets with low Issue Reset Spreads and claims to have positioned the fund for a modest upwards parallel shift in market yields. Mr. Normandeau works for Fiera, which is controlled by National Bank, as discussed on March 4, 2013.
It was a mixed day for the Canadian preferred share market, with PerpetualDiscounts off 3bp, FixedResets up 7bp and DeemedRetractibles gaining 2bp. Volatility was nonexistent. Volume was very extremely awfully low.
| HIMIPref™ Preferred Indices These values reflect the December 2008 revision of the HIMIPref™ Indices Values are provisional and are finalized monthly |
|||||||
| Index | Mean Current Yield (at bid) |
Median YTW |
Median Average Trading Value |
Median Mod Dur (YTW) |
Issues | Day’s Perf. | Index Value |
| Ratchet | 0.00 % | 0.00 % | 0 | 0.00 | 0 | -0.3980 % | 2,672.7 |
| FixedFloater | 4.17 % | 3.43 % | 24,483 | 18.49 | 1 | 0.7958 % | 4,163.9 |
| Floater | 2.89 % | 3.02 % | 64,020 | 19.67 | 4 | -0.3980 % | 2,763.8 |
| OpRet | 4.05 % | 1.63 % | 95,951 | 0.08 | 1 | 0.0395 % | 2,729.2 |
| SplitShare | 4.29 % | 3.83 % | 100,607 | 3.89 | 5 | 0.0716 % | 3,152.6 |
| Interest-Bearing | 0.00 % | 0.00 % | 0 | 0.00 | 0 | 0.0395 % | 2,495.6 |
| Perpetual-Premium | 5.49 % | 1.81 % | 75,065 | 0.09 | 20 | 0.0828 % | 2,440.8 |
| Perpetual-Discount | 5.28 % | 5.19 % | 105,033 | 15.13 | 16 | -0.0271 % | 2,586.3 |
| FixedReset | 4.25 % | 3.80 % | 187,613 | 8.43 | 75 | 0.0678 % | 2,555.3 |
| Deemed-Retractible | 5.01 % | 2.43 % | 106,290 | 0.26 | 42 | 0.0190 % | 2,561.3 |
| FloatingReset | 2.58 % | -1.43 % | 67,870 | 0.08 | 6 | 0.1239 % | 2,539.6 |
| Performance Highlights | |||
| Issue | Index | Change | Notes |
| No individual gains or losses exceeding 1%! | |||
| Volume Highlights | |||
| Issue | Index | Shares Traded |
Notes |
| ENB.PF.G | FixedReset | 197,730 | Recent new issue. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Limit Maturity Maturity Date : 2044-09-26 Maturity Price : 23.11 Evaluated at bid price : 25.00 Bid-YTW : 4.27 % |
| ENB.PR.D | FixedReset | 84,100 | Desjardins crossed 79,000 at 24.10. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Limit Maturity Maturity Date : 2044-09-26 Maturity Price : 22.96 Evaluated at bid price : 24.09 Bid-YTW : 4.15 % |
| PWF.PR.H | Perpetual-Premium | 68,309 | Nesbitt crossed 65,000 at 25.52. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2014-10-26 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 25.50 Bid-YTW : -7.41 % |
| GWO.PR.L | Deemed-Retractible | 52,500 | Desjardins crossed 11,800 at 25.89. RBC crossed 40,000 at the same price. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2017-12-31 Maturity Price : 25.25 Evaluated at bid price : 25.90 Bid-YTW : 4.75 % |
| POW.PR.G | Perpetual-Premium | 46,950 | RBC crossed 37,500 at 26.10. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Call Maturity Date : 2021-04-15 Maturity Price : 25.00 Evaluated at bid price : 26.11 Bid-YTW : 4.78 % |
| BAM.PR.K | Floater | 44,960 | Nesbitt crossed 40,000 at 17.25. YTW SCENARIO Maturity Type : Limit Maturity Maturity Date : 2044-09-26 Maturity Price : 17.26 Evaluated at bid price : 17.26 Bid-YTW : 3.04 % |
| There were 12 other index-included issues trading in excess of 10,000 shares. | |||
| Wide Spread Highlights | ||
| Issue | Index | Quote Data and Yield Notes |
| CIU.PR.C | FixedReset | Quote: 20.42 – 21.11 Spot Rate : 0.6900 Average : 0.4710 YTW SCENARIO |
| GWO.PR.H | Deemed-Retractible | Quote: 23.71 – 24.06 Spot Rate : 0.3500 Average : 0.2487 YTW SCENARIO |
| RY.PR.C | Deemed-Retractible | Quote: 25.56 – 25.84 Spot Rate : 0.2800 Average : 0.1794 YTW SCENARIO |
| POW.PR.A | Perpetual-Premium | Quote: 25.15 – 25.38 Spot Rate : 0.2300 Average : 0.1398 YTW SCENARIO |
| MFC.PR.H | FixedReset | Quote: 26.17 – 26.40 Spot Rate : 0.2300 Average : 0.1447 YTW SCENARIO |
| CGI.PR.D | SplitShare | Quote: 25.25 – 25.49 Spot Rate : 0.2400 Average : 0.1661 YTW SCENARIO |