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VERI stock has been the victim of mistaken identity with VERT and has suffered an overreaction in the panic selloff. The stock was trading above 2.25 before the confusion occured. Currently 1.50-1.625. Here is the story: [B] Vertica Software shrs fall amid confusion over ticker symbol [.23419] By Cameron Dueck, Bridge News New York--Feb 10--Vertica Software shareholders have been on a wild ride in the past several days as the company, which trades on the over-the-counter Bulletin Board, has lost its recently acquired ticker symbol to an Internet company set to go public this week. Vertica shares rose as much as 71% on an intra-day basis on Tuesday, but the company is currently down 52% as shareholders fumble to keep track of the company's shares. * * * Vertica, a software development company, was notified Tuesday morning by NASDAQ that it would have to give up its ticker symbol, VERT, by today to make room for VerticalNet, a hot new Internet initial public offering expected to hit the market this week. Today, Vertica is trading under the symbol VERI, assigned to them by NASDAQ against their wishes while the value of the stock has been cut in half. "You can imagine what we've been through here with the market like this and our investors getting confused," said Hans Nehme, chairman of the board and president of Vertica. Nehme said this was the first notice Vertica had received regarding the symbol change, leaving the company little time to get in touch with its shareholders. Nehme said Vertica's main concern now is to explain the situation to shareholders. Vertica merged with publicly traded Perfection Development Inc. in October, and the new company adopted the Vertica title and applied to the NASDAQ to use the VERT symbol. Their request was approved, and the symbol change, from the previous ticker of PDVP, was made effective on Jan 26. However, Vertica only got 2 weeks of use out of the VERT symbol. The IPO of VerticalNet, which was registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Nov 27, is cued to start trading this week, and according to NASDAQ policy, a company that trades over the counter must sacrifice its symbol for a NASDAQ-listed issue. NASDAQ has so far not been able to offer an explanation of why Vertica was not notified of the necessary change earlier when VerticalNet's request for use of the VERT symbol has been public knowledge for over 2 months. "They gave us their request for information, we gave them what was required, and we got the symbol we asked for--that's all that relevant to us right now," Nehme said. Nehme said he would like to see the NASDAQ's policy in writing. "Where can we refer to the rule in written form? We've only been offered it in oral form," Nehme said. "We'd like to see something. Give it to us in writing or refer us to something." NASDAQ spokesman Scott Peterson said as far as NASDAQ is concerned the matter has been cleared up under its usual operating procedures. He said while this is not a formal rule of NASDAQ, the exchange reserves the right t o change the symbol of a publicly traded company. "These symbols are not for sale. All these 4- and 5-letter symbols are owned by NASDAQ, they're NASDAQ's intellectual property," Peterson said. Vertica's attorney, Tom Armstrong of Bay Venture Council, said the company is still assessing the situation and trying to decide what action, if any, to take. Nehme said he cannot comment on the trading action in Vertica shares, but acknowledged "that volume was unusually high" on Tuesday. Vertica trading volume totaled 704,800 shares on Tuesday, up from 238,400 shares on Monday and up from the 10-day average of between 100,000 and 150,000 shares a day. Vertica shares closed at 2 1/4 on Jan 26, the day they began trading under the symbol VERT. On Monday, the shares hit a high of 4 7/8 before settling at 3 7/8. Vertica was last down 2 7/16 at 2 3/16. "Last week we attended a technology conference hosted by (NationsBanc Montgomery Securities) in San Francisco," said Nehme, adding that this may have drummed up interest in the stock and contributed to the rise in prices in the past 2 weeks. However, Nehme said the company has not released any information in the past several days that would have contributed to the volatile trade this week. The pricing of VerticalNet's IPO is expected to occur today, with trading tentatively set for Thursday under the symbol VERT. End News stories on this company from Bridge News Media://NewsSearch::/Source=mar/Symbol=vert/go/Search News stories from all vendors Media://NewsSearch::/Symbol=vert/go/Search Bridge News, Tel: (212) 372-7569 Send comments to Internet address: equity@bridge.com Feb-10-1999 12:56 GMT Symbols: US;VERI US;VERT Source [B] BridgeNews Global Markets Categories: I/SOF S/IPO S/NET S/STK CAP/STOCKS CAP/INDEX MR/NEWS | ||||||||||||
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