Zeev's Turnips Patch-No Politics (ZEEV)

[Zeev Hed]

My guess is that a lot of this deb was hedged as short against the box, that may reduce the short interest from around 25 MM shares to maybe only 15 MM shares in the next few month. The impact on earnings (reduction in interest of about $6.5 MM annually is minimal, and the increase in shares outstanding is under 10%. It will reduce the earning on equity by a little. The notes were due anyhow in 2006, so I am not sure why they are doing it now. If I was their CFO, I guess I would do this so I can exploit a market opportunity to replace this with a larger ($250 MM) issue which may be better priced early next year.