President/Founder Steps Down
After the close last night, Titan Machinery filed an 8K with the Securities and Exchange Commission announcing that the company's President, Peter Christenson, since 2003 will step down and take a
consulting role with the company and continue to earn his $500,000 a year salary. Peter Christenson will also resign as a member of the board of directors. a position he also has held for 12 years..(there is no mention if Mr. Christenson will continue to receive spousal travel benefits).
Proxy Statement
Only 4 days ago Titan Machinery filed a DEF 14 A proxy statement for the upcoming FY2016 annual meeting which is to take place in June. In the proxy disclosure Christenson is disclosed as a board member and president but it is still not clear if shareholders receiving this new proxy will be notified of the sudden resignation in time for the June vote. NO mention of who the new nominee will be for the 9th board seat that will now be vacant.
8K Director Resigns
8 weeks ago another board member since 2003 , James Williams, also announced he will be resigning from the board. That announcement came the same day that management released a preliminary FY2015 warning to the street that the company would lose in excess of $30 million for FY2015.
Mr. Williams is the current Chairman of the Nominating Committee and also a member of the 3 person Audit Committee.
Related Party Transactions (Where all the $ Goes)
In related party transactions, Peter Christian is disclosed as an owner of C.I.Farm Power.
History of Related Party Transactions of Titan Machinery (Where has All the Money Gone)
New Auditor=Less Disclosure
In the Spring of 2014 the company filed it's first DEF 14 A using the new auditor Deloitte and Touche. Company stated it no longer was required to disclose the transactions with the outside entity Dealer Sites LLC that management had held a position in because that equity interest had declined to less than 10%.
Although that disclosure was in the spring of 2014,
Dealer Sites LLC continued to receive their mailings to the care of Titan's treasurer Ted Christianson., although he supposively held less than 10% of such entity.
Dealer Sites LLC is important because less than 2 years ago TITAN increased their contract with Dealer Sites from $50 million to over $100 million and extended it out to 2028. This is prior to closing in excess of 10 location in that same period. There has been no disclosure as to whether any of the stores that have been closed were Dealer Sites lease locations. Titan is responsible for taxes and maintenance of those properties.
MAY 2014 Dealer Sites LLC address on tax bill was same as Titan Machinery But in the April 10K and DEF 14 A in April 2014 the disclosure stated Dealer Sites LLC relationship with Titan Management no longer needed to be disclosed.
As of Spring 2015 mailings for Dealer Sites LLC are being sent to the firm
C.T. Corporations Systems.
Titan is
disclosed as 1 of 250 companies that also has disclosure of that same address that CT Corporation states under Dealer Sites LLC.
Dealer Sites LLC disclosure from 2007
"Leases
We (TITAN MACHINERY) lease real estate for 24 of our 34 stores from
entities affiliated with Messrs. Meyer, Tony Christianson and/or Peter
Christianson. We lease three dealership sites from Meyer Family Limited
Partnership, for which Mr. Meyer serves as general partner and of which
certain members of Mr. Meyer’s immediate family are limited partners; 18
dealership sites from Dealer Sites, LLC, an entity affiliated by common
ownership with Mr. Meyer and Tony Christianson, who collectively owned 40%
of Dealer Sites, LLC as of January 31, 2007, and for which Ted
Christianson, our Vice President, Finance and Treasurer, serves as president
and Mr. Meyer serves as an officer; the site for our Fargo outlet store
from C.I. Farm Power, an entity affiliated by common ownership with Peter
Christianson; one dealership site from Padre Partnership, an entity affiliated
by common ownership with Peter Christianson, who is also the general partner;
and one dealership site from Landco LLC, an entity affiliated by common
ownership with Peter Christianson and Mr. Meyer."
Hanky Panky Note #4786
General Counsel/Corp. Compliance Officer/Secretary
Does the corporate Compliance Officer Need to be disclosed in SEC filings as an Officer of the Company? Should his Holdings be disclosed as well? I looked but I couldn't find Steve Noack name. It might be somewhere but I surely didn't find it.
ASSUMED NAME
Who is Aurora Distributing and Why did Titan Machinery create this assumed name the day prior to FY 2015 3rd quarter closed?
- 3. List the name and complete street address of all persons conducting
business under the above Assumed Name, OR if an entity, provide the
legal corporate, LLC, or Limited Partnership name and registered office
address:
Titan Machinery Inc.
644 East Beaton Drive
West Fargo, ND 58078
Mutual Fund Trading
Suspicious trading/Auditor Resignation
It was less than 2 years ago that the company's
original auditor abruptly resigned after the FY2014 shareholder meeting which coincided with very suspicious trading activity of Titan Machinery's common stock prior to the Fourth of July market holiday.
5 months after the Accounting Firm resigned the Securities and Exchange Division of Corporate Finance filed the following comment letter to Titan Machinery .
More Suspicious Trading March 2015
After close on March 9th Titan released disappointing warning that year end numbers would be disappointing and the shares were halted after hours.
Titan Machinery (NASDAQ: TITN)
suspiciously traded down 6% that day while the overall markets were all higher.
Wells Fargo Changes the Rules
The Titan Machinery Bonds are another can of worms.
