A five-minute period late on June 28 that saw Perma-Fix stock lose nearly a quarter of its value—dropping from $0.46 per share to $0.36 shortly after 4:00 p.m.—was “extremely odd,” President and Chairman Lou Centofanti said yesterday. “At exactly 4:00, 120,000 shares were sold … and then in after-hours trading we saw a purchase for 120,000 shares,” Centofanti said. The stock rebounded, opening July 1 at $0.45 per share and closing at the same value. “It was very unusual trading Friday afternoon. It’s pretty obvious that it was some weird event. … We don’t know motives for people,” Centofanti said, adding that it is unusual for the company to see much after-hours trading at all. “This is some kind of fluke. Perhaps someone made a mistake and pressed the wrong button. Who knows?”
The value of its stock price has been an issue for Perma-Fix over the last six months. In December the company was given six months to raise its share price above $1.00 for 10 consecutive trading days or it would de-list them. Unable to do so in that time, NASDAQ issued an 180-day deadline extension in June. Though Perma-Fix was valued at more than $1.00 for a short stretch in March, its stock has hovered between $0.65 and $0.85 for most of 2013 to date. Perma-Fix will propose a reverse-split at an upcoming shareholder conference; the method, which reduces the number of outstanding shares and increases par value of stock, was recently approved by USEC’s shareholders to boost that company’s stock value.
