Alberta Oilsands responds to dissidents

The board of Alberta Oilsands Inc (AOS) issued a press release today in response to the dissident actions of a “concerned” group of shareholders.

A letter was circulated to shareholders of the small oil explorer last Wednesday, demanding the resignation of the board.

Jack Crawford, chairman of Alberta Oilsands, said, “the dissidents claim their objective is to ‘build shareholder value,’ but they have not produced one shred of evidence that they could do so more quickly or effectively than your current board of directors and management team.”

AOS’s report outlined that in the last year the current board have led the company through significant milestones including: the sale of the Hanginstone property for $24.7 million, the addition of the Grand Rapids resource base and the work done to move the company’s Clearwater project towards approval.

The concerned shareholders have nominated seven new directors explaining that, “the current board are not aligned with the interests of AOS’ shareholders, as they have taken excessive compensation without personally investing in the Company, hence are incentivized only to continue to draw large salaries, without regard to building the share price of the company.”

In the release AOS maintain that the “dissidents appear unaware of the fact that timelines are determined by lengthy regulatory processes, and not by management.”  The release adds that the suggestion to examine alternate sites for the company’s phase 1 expansion would “take the lengthy regulatory review process back to the beginning, adding at least two, and more likely four, years to that process.”

Since the original act of rebellion the share price of Alberta Oilsands has risen 6% affording the Toronto-based company a $26 million market value.