pink sheets

Oldman answered 4 months ago …

In contrast to the above., I hold a lot of reputable "pinksheets" that are cross-listed on the TSX, which has details of the company. Many CanRoys trade on the pink sheets, and some large overseas companies that don't want to pay fees to the ADR-issuers, such as BONY_Mellon or CitiBank, because the float is low in the U.S., or comply with Sarbanes-Oxley, because they're not keeping their books by U.S. standards, do list on the PinkSheets.

Do your homework: go to the company's main listing on the London, or Toronto or Australian exchanges, and get their investor-relations site and read it!

Giant utilities, such as Germany's WRE, and France' SZE, have delisted their ADR's because of problems reconciling thier bookkkeping with Sarbanes-Oxley. Many more are following along..so many in fact that Mellon and others that "sponsored"-for a huge fee- the ADR's, are now charging annual fees to holders that are not receiving dividends, or deductiong increasingly large portions from the quarterly dividends:, AAUK dividends are now charged a "fee" to be proceessed by Mellon.

One thing to watch out for is the bid-asked spread on the pink-sheet traded firms, which can be larger than what a discount broker may overcharge to purchase the same security on an "overseas" stock exchange.

Get used to it, because more than 80% of the securities in the world, don't trade here...at all! The U.S. stock market no longer is the big elephant, and no longer commands the cachet and premia from listings.

In fairness to the other two posters., above CuWu and Dusty, there is a lot of crap on the pink sheets, but English and Scottish water utilities, British and Brazilian precious metal and gem companies (which have longer histories than the NYSE) trade there, as well as the following CanRoys: Pembina Pipeline; TimberWest: Primary Energy Recycling; Yellow Pages Income, Atlantic Power, Arc energy, etc. I hold positions in all of these and have for years enjoyed their dividends. But I researched the companies at their main trading centers on the Bourse, London, Australian and Toronto sites, before ourchasing their "pink sheet" equivalents, to avoid a large fee for purchasing a small amount of principal in ieach position, and I used very small premia over the bid price as the point to enter.