Expert: Steven Taylor - 7/28/2009

Question
Good Day Steve, I have inherited 6 shares of Bison Petroleum & Minerlas limited stock that shows "contersigned and registered / Guaranty Trust Company of Canada, Toronto, Canada  Transfer Agent & Registrar. The certificate is dated Feb 10/83.
Any chance there is a value on these shares ?

Answer
Gary, Bison is one of the most asked about companies, which is not at all surprising due to it having a very large number of shareholders in the 1970's and early 1980's, and the fact that the company subsequently reverse-split most of those shareholders out of existence but left most of the certificates floating around.

In 1987, the Company changed its name to United Bison and did a 1 for 100 reverse stock split immediately followed by a 100 for 1 forward split. The reason for the two splits was the huge number of company shareholders with under 100 shares. If they had less than 100 shares, the reverse split would result in them having less than 1 new share, and they would receive cash in lieu of the new shares. Since you have a certificate for only 6 shares dated prior to the 2 splits, it appears those shares would have been reversed out and the original holder would have received a very nominal cash payment (I believe the payment was less than 50 cents per pre-consolidation share) for the shares.