Cinar’s shares delisted

The Toronto Stock Exchange has delisted Cinar Corporation's shares, following a failure by the Canadian toon house to file audited financial statements. However, a sale of the company is imminent, says one Cinar exec.

Trading of the company’s stock on the TSE was originally suspended on August 30 2000 for failure to produce audited financials. Now a year later, Cinar is still not able to present acceptable financial information, so both its Variable Multiple Voting shares and Limited Voting shares were automatically delisted by the TSE.

Cinar has previously produced non-audited financial information for the first two quarters of 2001, fiscal years 2000 and 1999, as well as re-stated financial reports for fiscal years 1998 and 1997.

A statement from Cinar said: {Because new management is unable to make certain representations relative to such unaudited financial information, the company is unable to issue audited statements{.

Louise Sansregret, vp of investor relations and public affairs, told C21 that the company is disappointed that they couldn’t meet the TSE’s deadlines, but that they expect to be able to file audited financials by November 30, Cinar's 2001 year-end, at which time they may re-apply for listing on the TSE.

{We are in a strange situation, because most companies who have their stock delisted are not operational, or are bankrupt, but that is not the case with Cinar. We still have more than 600 employees who have been very faithful, and every division is still in operation,{ she said.

Sansregret also commented on the ongoing process of selling the company. {The finding of a partner is moving forward and we have a feeling that this will happen before November 30,{ she said.