Cable & Wireless HQ – The company’s stock traded at a high of $1.87 in November 2014.
On Friday last, the stock traded 603,857 units between 92 cents and $1.08. The order book for the stock changed markedly, from a bearish posture to a more aggressive one. Unlike the end of January when sell orders dominated buyers, the situation at the close on Friday was reversed, with buyers almost twice the number of sellers. Importantly, Mayberry’s 30 million units sell order at $1.50 for own account, is removed.
The market activity, suggests that something major is in the offing. In 2015, a group of large minority shareholders approached Cable & Wireless PLC to buy their shares. The Liberty Global takeover of the London listed company intervened. Local investors were expecting that the local company’s minority shareholders would have been made an offer for their shares. After not seeing an offer, interest in the stock fell and took the price with it, down to 65 cents. IC Insiders’ source indicates that a potential offer is likely to be in the making.
Cable and Wireless struggled for years as Digicel, its main rival, clobbered it in the Cell phone market, but the company has been making big strides in reversing the trend.
In addition C&W that focused attention on data service, is seeing that strategy paying rich dividends. The company reported just a small loss of $200 million in the September quarter and seemed to be on the way to making positive profit for 2017 onwards, with revenues growing 15 percent in the quarter and 13 percent for the six months. On the other hand Digicel is struggling as the market has moved towards data than voice and C&W grabs a larger share of the mobile market locally, leading Digicel to be looking at a sharp cut in staff numbers in the not too distant future.With revenues likely to continue to grow for a while, around $3 billion per year, C&W seems on target to make huge profits down the road, with the prospects of big gains in the stock price ahead.
Not many investors seem to see this picture, instead they focus on the short term developments, raising foolish questions about dividend payments and debt, when the two can’t be avoided. Under the companies Act dividends can’t be paid based on the large accumulated losses that have to be cleared first, while debt has been used to support the operations while it went through restructuring. The company is now cash flow positive and that should lead to debt reduction going forward subject to any large acquisition. Some minority shareholders who sought legal advice indicates that there were transactions that were effected that were not in the interest of the company.
An average of 104,395 units with an average value of $710,258 traded, compared to 46,481 units with an average value of $264,385 on the preceding trading day. The average for the month to date is 81,154 units with an average value of $438,934 versus 78,249 units with an average value of $405,018 on Thursday. The average for December is 131,147 units, at an average of $672,488.
to close at $7, with just 2,000 shares being exchanged by investors, Key Insurance traded 34,688 units to close at $3.10 after gaining 10 cents, to end at a 52 weeks’ closing high. KLE Group ended with 800 units changing hands at a 52 weeks high of $2.50. Lasco Distributors ended with 607,149 units trading, to close 3 cents higher at $7.03, Lasco Financial lost 25 cents with 122,767 shares changing hands, to end at $3.70. Lasco Manufacturing ended at $5.15, with 58,461 units trading, Medical Disposables closed with a rise of 5 cents at $4.50 with 16,500 shares changing hands and Paramount Trading ended with 87,972 shares changing hands at $3.55 to gain 15 cents.
Firm Trades| Angostura Holdings closed at $14.70, with 12,025 units changing owners, Clico Investments held firm at $22.60 with 581 shares being exchanged, First Citizens closed trading at $34.97 with 55 units changing hands, National Commercial Bank was unchanged at $3.10 with an exchange of 50,000 shares. National Flour closed at $2.40 with only 10 units being traded, Prestige Holdings ended trading at $11 with 164 shares changing hands, Scotia Investments held firm at $2.10 with trades of 112,000 units and Scotiabank closed at $58.75 with 786 shares changing ownership.
The market closed with 8 stocks with bids higher than their last sale and 2 with lower offers than their last sale.
General Accident traded 9,000 shares and lost 18 cents to close at $3, Honey Bun had 36,080 shares changing hands, to close at $5.80, after rising 30 cents. Iron Rock Insurance traded 28,053 units and fell by 10 cents to end at $4, Lasco Distributors ended with 37,600 units trading, to close at $7. Lasco Financial rose 28 cents with 47,364 shares changing hands, to end at $3.95, Lasco Manufacturing gained 15 cents to end at $5.15, with 103,347 units trading, Paramount Trading ended with 180,590 shares changing hands at $3.40 to gain 40 cents and tTech ended with 36,904 units changing hands at $5.50 after rising 40 cents.
The market closed with 9 stocks with bids higher than their last sale and 1 with a lower offer than their last sales.
General Accident traded 26,150 shares and rose 18 cents to close at a 52 weeks’ high, of $3.18, Honey Bun had 118,520 shares changing hands, to close at $5.50, after losing 45 cents. Jetcon Corporation lost 20 cents, to close at $6.80, with 12,450 shares being exchanged by investors, KLE Group ended with 30,000 units changing hands at $2.20, Lasco Distributors ended with 5,196 units trading, to close at $7. Lasco Manufacturing lost 10 cents to end at $5, with 2,526,478 units trading and Medical Disposables closed unchanged at $4.45 with only 600 shares changing hands.
Losses| First Citizens Bank closed at $34.97, for a loss of 1 cent with 509 shares changing owners, Massy Holdings was down 1 cent, closing trading at $51.99 with 472units traded. Scotiabank lost 2 cents to $58.75 with 2,519 shares changing ownership and Trinidad & Tobago NGL closed at $20.49, falling 1 cent with 108 units trading.
The market closed with 7 stocks with bids higher than their last sale and 3 with offers lower than their last sales.
Jetcon Corporation rose 50 cents, to close at a new all-time high of $7, with 15,647 shares being exchanged by investors. KLE Group ended with 50,200 units changing hands at $2.20, Lasco Distributors lost 21 cents and ended with 431,350 units trading to close at $7, Lasco Financial lost 27 cents and closed with 46,000 shares changing hands at $3.67. Lasco Manufacturing rose 6 cents to end at $5.10, with 138,933 units trading, Paramount Trading ended with 722 shares changing hands at $3 and tTech ended with 4,000 units changing hands at $5.50 after rising 20 cents.
Jamaica’s 
The main market of the Jamaica Stock Exchange, surged 3,247 points on Friday, cooled its heels on Monday as it failed to hang to decent gains at the start of trading of more than 1,000 points. 
In market activity, Berger Paints ended trading 19,503 shares to close at $6, Cable & Wireless fell 4 cents to close at 85 cents with 861,983 units trading, Caribbean Cement ended with a fall of $3.50 while trading just 55,850 shares to close at $30.50. Carreras closed at $66.75 with 8,460 shares changing hands, Ciboney traded 100,000 units to end at 20 cents, Investors traded 30,000 shares of 1834 Investments to close at $1.26 after rising 6 cents. Grace Kennedy had just 5,576 units trading with the price falling 49 cents to close at $40.50. Jamaica Broilers gained 10 cents and closed at $14.60 with 235,468 shares changing hands, Jamaica Producers lost 15 cents to end trading at $9.70 with 63,005 units changing hands, Jamaica Stock Exchange gained 4 cents in trading 20,973 shares, to end at $5.60. JMMB Group traded 60,705 units and added 45 cents to end at $15.45, Kingston Wharves jumped by $3.18 in trading 67,970 shares at a 52 closing high of $24.99, National Commercial Bank traded 14,858 shares with a fall of 80 cents to close at $50.21. 
Pan Jam Investment traded 13,614 shares at $26.50, Pulse Investments gained 30 cents in trading 43,803 shares at $4, Radio Jamaica fell 13 cents to close at $1.22 after 177,017 shares changed hands, Sagicor Group closed with 9,282 shares changing hands at $29.04. Sagicor X Fund ended with 9,981 units trading at $10.21 lost 29 cents, Scotia Group with 23,409 shares changing hands and closed with a fall of 1 cent at $38, Scotia Investments gained 3 cents with 4,906 units trading, to end at $31.05. Seprod closed at $30 with 4,642 units changing hands and Proven Investments ordinary share traded 6,555 units at 21.97 US cents.
The junior market surged 81.31 points, pushing the market index over the 2,700 mark for the first time, to end at a record 2,705.63 points at the close on Monday, with 5 securities trading at the close, at new all-time highs.
Securities that had bids above their last selling prices numbered just 4 on Monday and one ended with a lower offer. Since the start of last week there were a number of securities closing with large gaps between bids and last sale prices, with the exception of Eppley that has a bid of $8.01, compared to a last sale of $4.90, they have all traded higher to wipe out the major differences.
Jetcon Corporation rose 43 cents, to close at a new all-time high of $6.50, with 26,649 shares being exchanged by investors, Lasco Distributors ended with 58,900 units trading with a gain of 20 cents to close at $7.21, Lasco Financial rose 29 cents and closed with 10,912 shares changing hands at $3.94. Lasco Manufacturing rose 24 cents to end at $5.04, with 40,149 units trading, Medical Disposables traded 10,000, shares with a rise of 25 cents to close at $4.45, Paramount Trading ended with 26,700 shares changing hands at $3 and Eppley 8.25% preference share, ended with 283,500 units changing hands at $6.