Please don't take away Bahamasair's discounted flights to Miami, cheap hotel and car deals, discounts on baggage and $300 twice a year duty exemption.

It is the only relief poor black Bahamian's get from the Bay Street Boy's cheap Chinese crap, over priced goods, lack of selection, broken down stores, bumpy roads, crime invested streets, VAT, over priced shipping cost with only one monopolistic port of entry (Arawak) overcharging everyone to benefit of the Baystreet/Government owners.

I just love Miami. Nice Mall's (instead of broken down Malls), helpful clerks in shops, Bahamian's are welcomed in these stores because they know we are spending $2 billion a year in Florida so we are treated well. After shopping all day we can go to nice hotels, restaurants and maybe a nice basket ball game. While visiting our child in really nice colleges and universities...compared to you know what. Then we can go to a nice hospital and get quality medical care unlike the hospital in Nassau that is overcrowded and you have to wait 18 hours to get served in Emergency.

Some currency exchange house even use to take Bahamian dollars at 75 cents on the dollar so you can buy your superior goods in the US.

We just love our new Bahamasair planes and luggage discounts. Please please don't take this away from us. Stop listening to the merchant class and leave use poor people alone.

2. Will Aliv actually survive as a start up against BTC and foreign carriers.

I doubt it, but that's my personal opinion. BTC is owned by the Bahamas Government and Liberty Media, both loss making entities. Liberty Media had significant assets in Puerto Rico which suffered massive damage in last hurricane. It will be impossible for them to rebuild as no one will invest in the Caribbean with super hurricanes (wind greater than 150 mph/ greater than Cat 5) caused by global warming. This goes for Aliv as well. Lets just hope we don't have a super hurricane going through Nassau this year. Aliv, BTC and BEC will be complete write offs. Don't believe me? Dig a little deeper into Peurto Rico's recovery and financials. They are now bankrupt. A failed state, due to the hurricane.

Also the foreign carriers, Sprint etc., are competing aggressively for Bahamian customers in Miami. They are offering free low speed internet, free text, no roaming charges and only 20 cents a minute calls to the US. They are also offering free phones to Bahamians! Soon we won't just be shopping for cloths in Miami, we will be getting our phone service as well.

Also, with WhatsApp it doesn't really matter where your phone number is located. All calls are free!

Cable/Aliv's $500m needs to be checked for impairment.

I don't think I need go further.

Hi DonAnthony

Thank you for your well constructed comments.

Its actually refreshing to have a conversation with someone who is actually reading financial statements and assessing the risk of an investment as best as possible. Not not taking the company fluff published in the Tribune. Thank God they allow us bloggers!

For too long Bahamian's have blindly invested in Clico, Bank of the Bahamas, Gulf Union, Bahamas Supermarkets etc etc without actually reading the financial statements which are readily available to the general public. If they did many of them would not have lost millions of their hard earned savings.

Based on your comments we are actually discussing two different issues:

1. Should Aliv preference shares and bonds be available to the "average" small investor

and

2. Will Aliv actually survive as a start up against BTC and foreign carriers.

The answer to question one is that the management of Aliv have said no. Aliv is not going to allow small investors into their debt issue because it is not appropriate for them. I am not saying this. Aliv are saying this. They are not publishing on BISX their audited financial statements. I agree with Aliv. Start ups, as Aliv is, in numerous situations fail. If Aliv fails with a bunch of small time investors, the general public will scream to the government and Bisx as to why they weren't protected against such a speculative investment. All of the major tech companies in the US started out as private companies and not available to the general public due to risk. Eg. Google, Facebook and Microsoft. Uber is still private. Once they become profitable they can go public.

My only comment here is weather Bahamians realize it or not, if they own Cable Bahamas stock they have $189 million of Aliv's assets on their balance sheet. If Aliv fails, Cable stock price should be written down.

I suspect, based on only $12m in revenue and $55m in losses the auditors will need to take a significant write down of Cables assets this year.

Lets see.

Hi DonAnthony

With due respect you are not correct. Under the equity accounting method of consolidation, because Cable own's 48.75% of Alive the full results of Alive are consolidated into Cable's results. Any ownership over 20% must be consolidated into the parent companies financials.

http://bisxbahamas.com/wp-content/uploa…

See Note 21 in the financial statements link above. Actually the results of Aliv are even worse that I had imagined according to this note. Revenues of $12 million and losses last year of $55 million!

Aliv is not a publicly traded company so their non consolidated results are not published to the general public.

Based on my reading of the financial statements it is still my recommendation that Alive is correct in not allowing the general public to subscribe to this debt issuance. Let high net worth individuals and institutions loose their money. Lol.

However, the only problem here is that the pension funds have a high concentration risk to Cable/Aliv with over half a billion dollars owing.

This will not end well. Stay clear.

MadHatter

http://bisxbahamas.com/wp-content/uploa…

Count yourself lucky that the offering is only for high net worth individuals and institutional investors. Take a look at the financial on the above link and you will see that the company lost $15 million last quarter and had capital outlays of $21 million.

It also had total liabilities of $557 million...yes, that half a billion dollars!!! The entire Bahamas government, with all of their mis management only has 8 billion of debt.

Also, they only have $6 million in net revenues to service the half a billion of debts.

Now they are borrowing another $15 million and just got a loan of $50 million from its Chinese Vendors, Huawei. The debt is going to be so high that Huawei/Chinese will need to come in and be their savior. In the meantime the bond holds will be wiped out, just like the equity holders have already been wiped out.

I give it a couple of years. The Chinese are not going to pay the interest on all these loans forever. Baha Mar here we come!

Also, 5G is coming which will need another upgrade and I am sure Google will provide satellite internet to compete.

But no worries, I am sure National Insurance will subscribe to a bunch of Cable's bonds with what little is left of our retirement funds.

I am sure the both Knights have US$ bank account and access to the US capital markets which have provided greater returns than the Bahamas stock markets. These accounts have been outside of the Bahamas for decades.

I am also sure that both Knights have deep interest in monopolies (oil and gas) and cartels (banking, shipping etc) that provide them with unusually high returns in Bahamian dollars.

Us proletariat will just have to stay black and poor and fully shut out of the global markets like we have been for the last 200 years since the abolition of slavery.

I say let Bahamians do exactly what they want with their hard earned money. If they want to convert it to US dollars then let them. Why should only the rich have access to foreign capital.

Also, I say, let the damned Bahamian dollar float. Let it devalue. Most Bahamians have so little money that it wouldn't make a difference. The Knights don't want to devaluation because it acts as a natural mote to prop up the crony capitalistic endeavors.

On the other hand the Central Bank's relaxation of exchange control is laughable and will be ignored by the commercial banks (including those where the Knights have a big interest).

Essentially the Central Bank has put the burden of regulation of the new exchange control laws on the banks. The banks will now have to perform impossible fiduciary tasks. As the Knight said above, what is to prevent a business opening a US dollar account at every bank? To this I add, what happens when the balance goes above $100,000? Does the bank freeze the account because it is not in compliance with Central Bank regulations? Does it reject incoming wire transfers? What happens if a business man pays his child's school fees in Canada out of the account or runs his personal expense in Canada through the account? Is the bank suppose to regulate and inspect exactly what the payments are for? Suppose the business wires the funds out of the country to invest in the global capital markets and not use it to buy inventory? How are the banks going to police the accounts?

The answer is that the bank will not police the accounts, the banks will simply not open US dollar accounts for Bahamian businesses because during Central Bank inspections they will see that the accounts are not in compliance.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-…

Don't you just hate it when racially biased foreigners come to the Bahamas and blame everything on black people, call us dumb, stupid and uneducated and our leaders just sit back and take it out of fear they may not get a loan or their $8 billion in government debts won't get renewed.

The above article in the Canadian Globe and Mail Newsaper point to a more systemic and regional issue related to banking in the Caribbean. The problem with banking in the Caribbean is that it is not scalable as the markets are too small. Who wants to role out a technology platform for 300,000 people when you can role out a platform for hundreds of millions in north america? Who wants to deal with a bunch of legislators who clearly don't have a clue.

The Bahamian government makes it even harder when the role out basically impossible legislation to administer (e.g. the Homeowner's Bill) and the Regulator proudly roles out exchange control relaxation (virtually instructing the banks to regulate US accounts for Bahamians - the work fiduciary not a service provider). The Canadian banks will simply not give house loans and will simply not open up US accounts for Bahamians. E.g. One of the more idiot exchange control relaxations is that a US dollar bank balance can't go over US$100,000! So what is the bank to do? Stop taking deposits? Reject incoming wire transfers? Or supposed a business man uses the account to pay their child's school fees? What is the bank to do? Ask them why they are sending money to a school in Canada? No, no...the banks will simple not do the business and try to shut down as quickly as possible.

Adrian. Can you please resign as Chair of the Water and Sewerage Corp and do the work you were elected to do by the great people of Long Island?

The banks in Long Island do not accept cash anymore and rumor has it that one of them is about to close.

Businesses cannot operate efficiently without banking.

With no international airport, no foreign investment and a web shop in every settlement the people of Long Island are hurting. No one ever sees you on the island. If the election was held today you would not win. Neither would the PLP.

I could care less about the length of reverse osmosis contracts when I can barely keep the lights on.

Good point SP. Any statistics on how many small businesses are closing because of government red tape? VAT and VAT reporting requirements are a real small business destroyer.

I buy all my cloths at Walmart and Costco. A polo shirt for $6 in Walmart would be $40 in Nassau plus VAT if you can find something of similar quality and the correct size in Nassau.