"Even tho they can lift the restrictions
$150 is a lot of money when the shares
are free ')"
They can't unless they want to break the law. As I said, either the person at Etrade was misunderstood or they themselves did not know the regulations.
It is an unfortunate reality that those who "answer the phone" at a lot of discount brokers are remarkably ill informed. For questions of a regulatory nature it is best to ask for the compliance officer, a regulatory specialist or a supervisor. I suspect in this case the person at Etrade was actually referring to the cost and time to get the restricted legend removed AFTER the holding period was up...and were merely reading from some cheat sheet about that cost and time...or they assumed the stock was already eligible for legend removal.
But its not.
The fact is that the PURA dividend stock is restricted for ONE YEAR from the date of issue and there is no way around that.
As for the cost when it is time to get the restriction lifted...$150 is actually pretty good considering a lawyer has to be involved to write an opinion letter.
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