Is someone after Fairfax in the stockmarket and assembling a growing holding in the stock ahead of its annual meeting on Thursday week?
Fairfax shares have risen more than 15% since the end of September – from 94.5 cents to $1.09 yesterday.
That is the highest the shares have been since June 30 and the 14.2 million were traded on Monday and more than 17.5 million yesterday which was the highest two day volumes since late June after the buyout bids collapsed and speculators fled the stock.
In fact the daily share volumes this month have risen from around 3 million a day in the first week to yesterday’s figure of 17.59. The only change in substantial shareholdings was the move to 5.1% by the Commonwealth Bank on October 6. The 118 million or so shares traded so far this month is just over 5% of Fairfax’s capital (which is around 115 million).
The shareholders meeting will be held in Sydney on November 2. That will also vote on the company the spin off of its Domain property website which will leave Fairfax media with 60% of Domain and all the underperforming newspapers, a stake in the Stan streaming business and 56% of Macquarie Radio (mostly 2GB in Sydney and 3AW in Melbourne).
The date for entitlements to the spin off is expected to be 5pm on November 17, so the rising level of trading could be big shareholders topping up the holdings of Fairfax shares to maximise their entitlements to Domain scrip.
But whatever they are, the way the volumes have grown, especially in the past 10 days has been eye catching – 32 million in the first days of this week alone!
