Wellington Weekly
Wednesday Market Note (Friday Edition)
January 24, 2025
Subs -
WE ARE LIVE.
Qualified Canadian Readers Only.
The team at The Greenshoe is excited to share the achievement of a big growth milestone. This week, The Greenshoe has surpassed 400 loyal subscribers, and we are consistently averaging over 1.2K engaged readers per Wellington Weekly.
When we first started The Greenshoe it was our goal to fill a niche void in the market. Discuss Canadian financial topics that tend to get overlooked, such as the always exciting independent capital markets landscape. Or the grifters that play in the shadows. We call it Murmurs of the PATH. Since launch, the reception has been nothing short of fantastic. We have covered a range of topics from energy spin-offs to stock promotion "brilliance" to the shake-up in debt banking. Recently, we set out to fill another gap in the market - unbiased league tables. In December of last year we launched Reviewing Richmond, an unfiltered look at Canadian league tables across ECM, DCM, M&A, Legal Counsel and Restructuring Advisors - no fluff, just stats. Once again, the feedback has been positive.
We could not have achieved such an accomplishment without your loyalty. We look forward to the next milestone as we set our sights on big goals!
Last week was fairly tame with 11 issuers tapping the equity and debt markets (excluding normal course bank capital structure financings). The largest of the bunch was Ivanhoe Mines’ $750 MM senior notes financing. The deal priced at 7.875% in USD, and was led by Citi and BMO. Staying theme with bond world, Bonterra Energy borrowed $135 MM in the second-lien secured bond market, issuing bonds at 10.5% with a 1.8% original issue discount. RioCan REIT followed Bonterra in the unsecured debenture market, borrowing $550 MM to refinancing existing indebtedness. TD and BMO acted as lead agents.
Moving down the food chain, Beacon and Cormark kicked-off the week with a $22 MM bought deal of common shares for Zedcor Inc. - a $320 MM Canadian-based security company. The deal was priced at a 6.5% discount to market close.
Canaccord Genuity announced 2 sole-led deals across crypto and AI. Pelican Canada and Torrent Capital tapped the market for $5 MM and $10 MM, respectively. The use of proceeds for Torrent is to purchase…you guessed it, Solana coin. Torrent is the third deal led by Canaccord Genuity where the issuer is pivoting core strategy to buy Solana coin. The Torrent deal is being co-led by Ventum Financial.
B2Gold tapped the convertible debt market with a US$400 MM 5-year convertible notes offering. The deal was priced at 2.75% coupon, up 35%. HSBC-led the syndicate of dealers followed by Scotia and CIBC. The stock traded down ~5% since announcement - which is typical for convertible notes offerings of this size as the hedging takes effect (see my note on the mechanics of convertible notes). I continue to pound the table on the activity being seen in the convertible debt markets in both Canada and the U.S. - it may be worth another note to further discuss mechanics.
Lastly, stay tuned as I plan on publishing a Special Report this weekend.
ECM World
Top Notable Transactions
Blackrock Silver Corp.
$10MM Bought Deal of Units
RJ
Torrent Capital
$10MM Marketed Offering of Units
CG w/ Ventum
Robex Resources
$30MM Marketed Offering of Commons
SCP
Zedcor Inc.
$22MM Bought Deal of Commons
Beacon w/ Cormark, RJ, CG, Paradigm
Cheers,
G.G.