The Money Mustache Community
Learning, Sharing, and Teaching => Investor Alley => Topic started by: Financial.Velociraptor on February 21, 2023, 09:30:58 AM
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I have a tiny position in TECK (1 long call). It is long dated and TECK has recently announced they will spin off their metallurgical coal business to shareholders. Will my call strike be adjusted for this corporate action?
Honestly, I just liked the safety and income profile of a diagonal call here. I will probably just unwind when my short call expired.
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Internet says your contract will be updated such that the deliverable includes same number of original company shares + the appropriate amount of spun-off shares. Seems to indicate the strike does not get changed usually. So, same strike price but now whoever is delivering shares if the option executes is delivering a Company ABC Share AND a Company XYZ share for that price (if the spinoff was 1-1 - would be 1 ABC share + y XYZ shares for a spinoff ratio 1:y).
Also apparently there is an adjustment board involved that finalizes any details - particularly important in the event this needs to be unusual for some reason.
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The call strike might not be adjusted but the share price will be, and that could move your call out of the money.
I've seen cases where a call for 100 shares of XYZ at $10 is replaced by a call for e.g. 80 shares of XYZ at $10. Then again if the company pays a special dividend there are usually other types of adjustments for that sort of thing. It's complicated. Maybe the company's investor relations department can help?
It's hard enough to predict the details of this situation I'd probably prefer not to own those calls.