KEY POINTS:
Navman founder Peter Maire has increased his stake in eftpos company Cadmus to 19.8 per cent.
There was heavy turnover in Cadmus yesterday with 20 million shares traded at 18 cents.
In a substantial security holder notice, Mr Maire said his Tahia Investments vehicle had lifted its stake from around 15 per cent previously.
Cadmus has 271 million shares on issue.
It was not immediately clear who had bought the other shares traded yesterday.
Mr Maire also owns 5 per cent of rival eftpos company Provenco and executives and major shareholders of both companies are on record as saying a merger of the two seems logical.
Todd Capital, the investment arm of the Todd family, New Zealand's wealthiest, yesterday was granted a board position on the Provenco board after it recently lifted its stake to 19.43 per cent from 12 per cent. Chris Morrison was appointed a director.
Mr Maire told NZPA late last year that the best thing for Cadmus and Provenco was to merge so they could scale up to become a global player.
The Warehouse founder Stephen Tindall, noted for "angel investing" in high tech companies, has a 5 per cent stake in Provenco, while low-profile Timaru investor and philanthropist Alan Hubbard is also a shareholder in both Cadmus and Provenco.
Cadmus shares were unchanged on 19.5 cents today. Provenco shares were down 1 cent on $1.01.
In a later substantial security holder notice, The Law Trust said it had sold 13.5m shares, cutting its stake from 15 percent to 8.26 percent.
The Law Trust was formed over six years ago to consolidate shareholders' interests of the companies that were brought together to form Cadmus Technology at the time of listing.
The consolidation of the shares into a single trust enabled a single entity to represent the various individual shareholders.
Trustees, Cadmus chief executive Ian Bailey and John Nimmo, who have managed the trust, said it was agreed in December 2005 that some beneficiaries wanted to convert their holdings back into their own names while others wanted to cash up.
Mr Bailey said that with the changes in Cadmus shareholding over the past few years and the progressive dilution of their holdings, some of the beneficiaries have felt that the role of the trust had changed.
- NZPA
