Any idea what this means for shareholders?
A good place to begin your search for information is the SEC FAQ concerning trading suspensions:
sec.gov
BTW - The full notice of the LIFR trading suspension is now available at sec.gov
I am not sufficiently familiar with LIFR to comment on its specific prospects. Hence all of the following is based on my impressions of what happened with other suspended stocks (or, more accurately, on my possibly faulty and undoubtedly incomplete recollections and opinions concerning what happened to these stocks)
I have followed a number of other stocks that have undergone SEC mandated trading suspensions. Long holders of these stocks normally fare very badly after the suspension. I cannot tell you whether LIFR will do better or worse than the average suspended stock, however, it may be useful to know the range of possible outcomes. With this in mind, let me make some observations about the range of possibilities based on other stocks whose trading was suspended by the SEC:
1. The stock may, for all practical purposes, never trade again (IOW, trading takes place either with extremely low frequency or never). While I believe this still happens occasionally, more commonly the stock trades daily or almost daily off the OTCBB in Pink Sheet style trading.
2. Post suspension trading, if it occurs, will probably be extremely volatile - particularly on the first day after the suspension ends. This probably results from a number of factors such as uncertainty concerning the company's prospects and the large bid/ask spreads inherent in Pink Sheet type trading as opposed to the often more liquid market of the OTCBB.
3. Post suspension prices will usually be less than those prior to the halt - often much less. If the stock does trade higer, special circumstances will likely play a key role. For example, one stock that traded higher was the subject of several USA Today stories, at least one of which occurred during the halt. While the stories (IMO) conveyed nothing that the average investor would consider as a basis for buying the stock, the widespread publicity did bring the stock enough new buyers to see a very transient rise in price.
4. The stock rarely returns to the OTCBB. I can recall only one stock that was suspended in the last few years that made it back, namely shopping.com (IBUY). One factor that may have played a role in IBUY's return to the OTCBB was that the primary focus of SEC's attention (IMO) was IBUY's underwriter and primary MM, rather than the company itself. IBUY was a reporting company and promptly updated its EDGAR filings after the halt. There may have been other companies with recent trading suspensions that returned to the OTCBB - if so, I would appreciate hearing about them.
For more information about SEC trading suspensions, see #reply-4304442 and #reply-4305156. Unfortunately, the information in those posts is now somewhat dated and some of the links no longer work. For those wishing to research what happened to other recently suspended stocks, a list of such stocks can be found at sec.gov
In closing, let me reiterate that the above observations are based on past suspended stocks rather than any special knowledge or insight concerning LIFR. What happens to LIFR could differ, for better or for worse, from what happened to these other stocks.
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