Expert: Steven Taylor - 2/27/2011

Question
My grandmother recently found some old stock certificates my grandfather had and we were wondering if they are worth anything or if any of the companies are still around?
They are:
Racad Technologies Ltd. - 1500 shares
Queenston Gold Mines Ltd. (from 1946) - 8 shares
Pickle Crow Gold Mines Ltd. (from 1956) - 1050 shares
Consolidated Halliwell Ltd. (from 1957) - 2000 shares
Donalda Mines Ltd. (from 1950) - 400 shares
Gulch Mines Ltd (from 1956) - 1000 shares

Answer
Brittney, from the information I have available:

Racad had no value. It was delisted in 2000, but continued to file its required regulatory information until 2005, at which point it was cease-traded for failure to file. That order remains in effect.

Queenston is now Queenston Mining. It trades for about $6 a share on the TSX.

Pickle Crow is extremely complicated. It became 2 companies. The first had at least 2 reverse splits (a 1 for 5 and a 1 for 3) and is now Enerplus. The second had a 1 for 200 reverse split and was acquired by Teck on the basis of 2 Teck for every 5 old shares.

Consolidated Halliwell has no value. It became International Halliwell, which had its charter cancelled in 1981.

Donalda became Aldona after a 1 for 9 reverse, then became TCF Energy (1 new for 10 old shares), then Trigas Exploration, which was acquired by Calpine in 2000 for $3.20 per share cash.

Gulch Mines has gone through at least 6 name changes and acquisitions. It is incredibly complicated, and I am not even sure how many shares or which company it might be today.

Because of the complications of the Pickle Crow and the Gulch, I highly recommend you contact a broker to confirm this information and have their people determine the value of each today. They can also help you with the Queenston. For the Donalda, if your grandfather did not receive a check in 2000, the money would have likely been turned over the government for safekeeping. You need to search every missing property office in each State or Province in which he lived from the date of the certificate until the takeover in 2000. You can search many of them online at www.missingmoney.com and www.naupa.org (check both).