Ned, GRNO owns the 52% of the partnership, not Bill personally. GRNO had the manager's 10% originally, and, as you note, has acquired the other 42% (14 ownership units equal to 3% of the total value each) by issuing stock. The provision for the exchange was in the original partnership offering; Bill and his advisors never supposed that stock would ever be in the current price range, and eventually tried to get the provision rescinded or waived to prevent the exchange (in order to prevent dilution). But a contract is a contract, and the people who wanted to exchange insisted on execution. The remaining 16 units are still in other hands. I don't know about other holders, but Brenda and I took the position that the processor would always hold some value, even if the stock did not.
One of the principal benefits to GRNO, and therefore to its stockholders, of restarting the processor is that the company acquires 52% of all cash distributions, which would be sufficient to keep the office going indefinitely. Then, of course, there's always the advertising value of a processor producing a track record over an extended length of time.
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