Expert: Steven Taylor - 8/6/2010

Question
My Grandma recently passed away and we found a certificate with 25 Alscope stocks but cant figure out who to contact to find out what these are worth. I guess the company was bought out by the Canadian Gov any info on what they might be worth?

Answer
Rebecca, I have been asked about Alscope numerous times. There are a lot of old certificates out there, which is not surprising considering the company sold a ton of stock illegally in the US. The SEC caught them and shut down its US sales and trading. To sell and trade in the US, a company has to be legally registered with the SEC, and they were not.

The company did a 1 for 10 reverse split and became Almarco Industries, which was struck from the Corporate register in 1995 by Alberta. That suggests no value at all, and there is no information that the Company was ever bought out, either by the Canadian Government or anyone else.