BSC.PR.A: Dividend Policy Revised

BNS Split Corp. II has announced:

The Company has revised its Capital Share dividend policy and has determined that it will not pay a dividend on the Capital Shares if the Net Asset Value per Unit at the time of declaration, after giving effect to the dividend, would be less than or equal to the original issue price of the Preferred Shares. In such circumstances, any excess dividends received on The Bank of Nova Scotia common shares (“BNS Shares”) minus the dividends payable on the Preferred Shares and all administrative, operating and income tax expenses will be reinvested in short-term debt securities or BNS Shares. However, as long as the Net Asset Value per Unit at the date of declaration exceeds such amount, the Company intends to pay a dividend on the Capital Shares equal to the excess of the dividends received on the BNS Shares minus the Preferred Share dividends and all administrative, operating and income tax expenses. Based on yesterday’s closing sale prices of the BNS Shares and after giving effect to the Capital Share dividend, the Net Asset Value per Unit would be $27.10 or $6.27 in excess of the original issue price of the Preferred Shares.

Not much, perhaps (as noted by DBRS when downgrading ES.PR.B), but better than nothing! The original policy had no Asset Test:

It will be the policy of the Board of Directors to declare and pay quarterly dividends on the Capital Shares in an amount equal to the dividends received by the Company on the BNS Shares minus the distributions payable on the Preferred Shares and all administrative and operating expenses. Based on the current BNS Share dividends and estimated expenses of the Company, the Company expects to pay quarterly dividends of $0.0420 per Capital Share ($0.1680 per year or approximately 1.46% of the Capital Share offering price).

BSC.PR.A was last mentioned on PrefBlog when it was downgraded to Pfd-3 as part of the DBRS Mass SplitShare Downgrade. BSC.PR.A is not tracked by HIMIPref™.

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