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The Cash Store Australia Holdings Inc. completes merger with Bubbee Ventures Inc.
3/6/2009 12:00:00 AM
TORONTO, March 6 /CNW/ - The Cash Store Australia Holdings Inc. ("TCS") is pleased to announce that it has completed its previously announced amalgamation (the "Amalgamation") with Bubbee Ventures Inc. ("Bubbee") under the provisions of the Business Corporations Act (Ontario). The amalgamated company, also to be known as The Cash Store Australia Holdings Inc. ("Amalco"), currently operates 22 pay day advance branches in the States of Victoria, Queensland, and Tasmania, Australia through its Australian subsidiary, The Cash Store Australia PTY Limited ("TCS Australia"). TCS Australia acts as a broker to facilitate pay day advance services to income-earning consumers.
Edward McClelland, TCS Chief Executive Officer said, "As a result of taking TCS public through the merger, we now have the necessary platform to execute upon our accelerated growth strategy. There is clearly a high consumer demand for pay day advance services in Australia. Our objective is to become the dominant player in this new market."
Pursuant to the Amalgamation, shareholders of Bubbee received one common share of Amalco for every 1.50 of their Bubbee shares and shareholders of TCS received one common share of Amalco for each TCS share. Following the Amalgamation there are 16,375,482 common shares issued and outstanding of which approximately 94% are held by former shareholders of TCS and approximately 6% are held by former shareholders of Bubbee. The Amalgamation was approved by the respective shareholders of Bubbee and TCS. The common shares of Amalco have been conditionally approved and are expected to begin trading next week on the TSX Venture Exchange under the symbol "AUC".
Management of the new company will be led by a team consisting of Edward McClelland, Chief Executive Officer; Nancy Bland, Chief Financial Officer and Matthew Callahan, Managing Director. Gordon J. Reykdal will serve as Chairman of the new board of directors, which shall also include Edward McClelland, Matthew Callahan, Robert Lees and Roopinder Mundi.
As a result of the completion of the Amalgamation, The Cash Store Financial Services Inc. (TSX: CSF) ("TCS Financial") announces that it has acquired ownership of 3,000,000 common shares of Amalco, approximately representing 18.3% of the issued and outstanding Amalco shares. TCS Financial has acquired the Amalco shares for investment purposes and TCS Financial may from time to time acquire additional securities of Amalco, dispose of some or all of the existing or additional securities they hold or will hold, or may continue to hold their current position.
Forward Looking Information
This News Release contains "forward-looking information" within the meaning of applicable Canadian securities legislation. Forward-looking information includes, but is not limited to, information with respect to our objectives, strategies, operations and financial results. Generally, forward-looking information can be identified by the use of forward-looking terminology such as "plans", "expects", or "does not expect", "is expected", "budget", "scheduled", "estimates", "forecasts", "intends", "anticipates", or "does not anticipate", or "believes" or variations of such words and phrases or state that certain actions, events or results "may", "could", "would", "might", or "will be taken", "occur", or "be achieved". In particular this News Release contains forward-looking statements in connection with the listing and commencement of trading of Amalco shares on the TSX Venture Exchange. Forward-looking information is subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause the actual results, level of activity, performance or achievements of Amalco, to be materially different from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking information, including but not limited to the satisfaction of listing conditions. All material assumptions used in making forward-looking statements are based on management's knowledge of current business conditions and expectations of future business conditions and trends. Although we believe the assumptions used to make such statements are reasonable at this time and have attempted to identify in our continuous disclosure documents important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in forward-looking statements, there may be other factors that cause results not to be as anticipated, estimated or intended. Certain material factors or assumptions are applied by us in making forward-looking statements, include without limitation, factors and assumptions regarding our continued ability to fund our pay day loan business, rates of customer defaults, relationships with, and payments to, third party lenders, demand for our products, as well as our operating cost structure and current consumer protection regulations. There can be no assurance that such information will prove to be accurate, as actual results and future events could differ materially from those anticipated in such information. Accordingly, readers should not place undue reliance on forward-looking information. We do not undertake to update any forward-looking information, except in accordance with applicable securities laws.
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For further information: Edward McClelland, Chief Executive Officer, Ph.: (905) 632-7594, The Cash Store Australia Holdings Inc., E-mail: emcclelland@sympatico.ca; Or Nancy Bland, Chief Financial Officer, Ph.: (780) 732-5683, The Cash Store Australia Holdings Inc., E-mail: nancy.bland@csfinancial.ca