Replies to post #111840 on Savvy Trades and Investments

[littlefish]

STCN Looks like Steel Partners has full control by a wide margin in a rather sus preferred share issuances a little while back (series C then later series E). I didn’t look real deep. The underlying biz is shrinking but was a bit above break even operationally. Regardless, there looks to be a lot of legal history hair with SPHG and other shareholders thru time. Time has not been kind to the share price during all the tumult as well (taking into account the reverse split).

https://www.accesswire.com/708439/hillandale-advisors-delivers-open-letter-to-steel-connects-board-of-directors

Some of the older legal stuff:
“On April 13, 2018, a purported shareholder, Donald Reith, filed a verified complaint, Reith v. Lichtenstein, et al., 2018-277 (Del. Ch.) in the Delaware Court of Chancery (the “Reith litigation”). The complaint alleges class and derivative claims for breach of fiduciary duty and/or aiding and abetting breach of fiduciary duty and unjust enrichment against the Board of Directors, Warren G. Lichtenstein, Glen M. Kassan, William T. Fejes, Jack L. Howard, Jeffrey J. Fenton, Philip E. Lengyel and Jeffrey S. Wald; and stockholders Steel Partners, Steel Partners, Ltd., SPHG Holdings, Handy & Harman Ltd. and WHX CS Corp. (collectively, the "Steel Parties") in connection with the acquisition of $35.0 million of the Series C Convertible Preferred Stock by SPHG Holdings and equity grants made to Messrs. Lichtenstein, Howard and Fejes on December 15, 2017 (collectively, the "Challenged Transactions"). The Company is named as a nominal defendant. The complaint alleges that although the Challenged Transactions were approved by a Special Committee consisting of the independent members of the Board of Directors (Messrs. Fenton, Lengyel and Wald), the Steel Parties dominated and controlled the Special Committee, who approved the Challenged Transactions in breach of their fiduciary duty. Plaintiff alleges that the Challenged Transactions unfairly diluted stockholders and therefore unjustly enriched Steel Partners, SPHG Holdings and Messrs. Lichtenstein, Howard and Fejes. The complaint also alleges that the Board of Directors made misleading disclosures in the Company's proxy statement for the 2017 Annual Meeting of Stockholders in connection with seeking approval to amend the 2010 Incentive Award Plan to authorize the issuance of additional shares to accommodate certain shares underlying the equity grants. Remedies requested include rescission of the Series C Convertible Preferred Stock and equity grants, disgorgement of any unjustly obtained property or compensation and monetary
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damages. On June 8, 2018, defendants moved to dismiss the complaint for failure to plead demand futility and failure to state a claim. On June 28, 2019, the Court denied most of the motion to dismiss allowing the matter to proceed. The defendants answered the complaint on September 6, 2019, denying all liability.

On August 13, 2021, the Company, together with certain of its current and former directors of the Board, Warren Lichtenstein, Glen Kassan, William Fejes, Jr., Jack Howard, Jeffrey Fenton and Jeffrey Wald, as well as other named defendants (collectively, the “Defendants”), entered into a memorandum of understanding (the “MOU”) with Donald Reith (the “Plaintiff”) in connection with the settlement of the Reith v. Lichtenstein, et al., C.A. No. 2018-0277-MTZ (Del. Ch. 2018) class and derivative action. A definitive Stipulation of Settlement (the “Stipulation”) incorporating the terms of the MOU was filed with the Court on February 18, 2022. Pursuant to the MOU and Stipulation, and contingent on approval of the terms by the court, the Defendants agreed to cause their directors’ and officers’ liability insurance carriers to pay to the Company $2.75 million in cash.

Additionally, under the MOU and separate letter agreements between the Company and such individuals (the “Surrender Agreements”), Messrs. Lichtenstein, Howard and Fejes agreed to surrender to the Company an aggregate 3.3 million shares that they had initially received in December 2017 in consideration for services to the Company. The surrenders and cancellations are in the following amounts: for Mr. Lichtenstein, 1,833,333 vested shares and 300,000 unvested shares; for Mr. Howard, 916,667 vested shares and 150,000 unvested shares; and for Mr. Fejes, 100,000 vested shares. On August 17, 2021, Mr. Lichtenstein and Mr. Howard surrendered the shares required under the MOU, the Stipulation and their respective Surrender Agreements, and in December 2021 Mr. Fejes did the same. All such shares were subsequently cancelled. Pursuant to the MOU and Stipulation, the Company also agreed to pay the Plaintiff’s counsel legal fees for this matter in an amount up to $2.05 million, if approved by the court.

After the parties filed papers in support of court approval of the settlement, and an objector filed papers in opposition to approval of the settlement, and after hearings held on August 12 and August 18, 2022, the parties submitted an amendment to the Stipulation: (i) increasing the proposed total contribution of the insurers to $3.0 million, (ii) reducing Plaintiff’s counsel’s fee request to $1.6 million, and (iii) providing that if the then pending proposed Merger was consummated, the $3 million, minus fees awarded to Plaintiff’s counsel and costs of distribution of up to $125,000, would be distributed to the holders of eligible shares of Common Stock (as defined in the Merger Agreement governing the Merger), other than the Defendants; provided, however, that no distribution would be required to be made to any holder whose proportionate share of the distribution would be less than $1.00. On September 23, 2022, the court ruled that it was denying approval of the settlement. At the court’s instruction, the parties provided a status report on October 24, 2022, reporting that the vote on the proposed Merger had been postponed to October 28, 2022, and proposing to file a revised status report on November 23, 2022. The parties filed the status report on November 23, 2022, reporting that due to the termination of the proposed Merger on November 15, 2022, the parties were conferring on the next steps, and therefore proposed providing another status report within 30 days, or on other such date as the court may order. On November 28, 2022, the court issued a minute order advising that no further status updates were required to be filed in the matter and noting that the court would remain available to hear requests for relief as needed. No trial date or pretrial deadlines are currently scheduled. The possible recovery, if any, with respect to this dispute cannot be determined as of the date of this Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q.”

The extensive legal drama thru time keeps me away.

Another unhappy camper: https://seekingalpha.com/instablog/25863103-mohlad/5601743-letter-to-steel-connect-special-committee

The series E- https://capedge.com/filing/914712/0001213900-23-034185/STCN-8K/file/6

All IMO only.

[littlefish]

STCN- I’ll have to look closer when I get time. Just the knee jerk reaction was a lot of drama.

I’d need to look at the preferreds harder to look at potential dilution or such,

“ The number of shares of Company’s common stock issuable upon the exercise of Series C Preferred Stock and the Series E Preferred Stock immediately prior to the Reverse/Forward Stock Split were proportionately decreased and the conversion price of the Series C Preferred Stock and the Series E Preferred Stock were proportionately increased, effective as of June 21, 2023, the close of business on the date of such Reverse/Forward Stock Split. Our authorized preferred stock was not affected by the reverse stock split and continues to be 3,535,000 shares of preferred stock, with a par value of $0.01 per share.”

Ah looks like Steel partners gets to utilize the NOLs to some degree:
“ On April 30, 2023, the Company and Steel Holdings executed a series of agreements, in which Steel Holdings and the Steel Partners Group transferred an aggregate of 3.6 million shares of common stock, par value $0.10 per share, of Aerojet Rocketdyne Holdings, Inc. ("Aerojet") held by the Steel Partners Group to the Company in exchange for 3.5 million shares of newly created Series E Convertible Preferred Stock of Steel Connect (the “Series E Convertible Preferred Stock” and such transfer and related transactions, the "Exchange Transaction"). Following approval by the Company's stockholders pursuant to the rules of The Nasdaq Stock Market LLC at a special meeting of stockholders held on June 6, 2023, the Series E Convertible Preferred Stock is convertible into an aggregate of 19.8 million shares of the Company's common stock, par value $0.01 per share (the “common stock” or “Common Stock”), and votes together with the Company's common stock and participates in any dividends paid on the Company's common stock, in each case on an as-converted basis. Upon conversion of the Series E Convertible Preferred Stock, the Steel Partners Group would hold approximately 84.0% of the outstanding equity interests of the Company, and the Company became a consolidated subsidiary of Steel Holdings for financial statement purposes.”

So with the dilution, the market cap would be closer to $250+ million I think… Not all that cheap to me if I’m glancing at it right, especially given the control structure.

All IMO only.