Canso Investment Counsel disclosed a 5.4% stake in BlackBerry on its regulatory filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
The filing showed that the Canadian investment management firm current owns 30,204,300 shares of BlackBerry, which includes shares issuable upon the conversion of $300 million principal amount of convertible debentures of the company.
Based on the current stockholding of Canso Investment Counsel, it is now the third largest shareholder of BlackBerry behind PRIMECAP Management and Fairfax Financial Holdings.
Canso Investment participated in BlackBerry’s $1 billion bond sale
Canso Investment Counsel is among the institutional investors that participated in BlackBerry’s $1 billion convertible bond sale, which was led by Fairfax Financial Holdings on November 2013.
The sale of the convertible bonds, which pays 6%, can be converted into stock for $10 per share. The transaction helped BlackBerry boost its liquidity after Fairfax Financial Holdings cancelled its plan to take the Canadian technology company private after conducting due diligence.
At the time of the investment, John Chen was appointed executive chairman and interim CEO and Prem Watsa joined as lead director of BlackBerry. Chen dropped the term interim from his title on January last year after the shares of the company increased 31% since his appointment.
The share of BlackBerry closed $9.93 per share, up by 0.30% on Thursday at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). Over the past 52-weeks, the stock traded between $7.01 and $12.63 per share.
Amazon.com offers 10% discount on BlackBerry Classic
Amazon.com is offering a 10% discount on the BlackBerry Classic. The smartphone is now $403.46, down from its original retail price of $449. Consumers who are interested are interested with the BlackBerry Classic can take advantage of the price cut by purchasing it directly from the e-commerce giant.
BlackBerry recently announced its partnership with 1010, a telecommunications service provider in Hong Kong to offer its Enhanced SIM-Based Licensing (ESBL) service to enterprise clients in the country. The ESBL service would provide enterprise clients the access to BES12, which supports the BlackBerry 10 operating systems and other major platforms including the Android, iOS and Windows Phone OS.
