At this very moment, beleaguered Blockbuster's PR peeps are preparing a statement to explain why, moments ago, its stock stopped being traded on the New York Stock Exchange. At present, it's stuck at a whopping 23 cents. NYSE spokesperson Mirtha Medina sends this brief note: "BBI was halted today at 10:43 a.m. for News Pending."
But one Blockbuster spokesperson to whom I spoke this morning said look no further than yesterday's filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, in which Blockbuster notes that despite the early results from last week's shareholder meeting, well, see, shareholders didn't really OK that reverse stock split, which would have collapsed Class A and Class B stock into one, after all. Which has something to do with today's halt.
And for those keeping score, today's also a rather big day at Blockbuster: The company's supposed to pay $41.5 million toward its nearly $1 billion debt on July 1. But it only has about $109 million in cash on hand.