SEC Company Response from Waste Connections, Inc. (WCN) (CIK 0001318220) (WCN) — Mar 17, 2010
Waste Connections, Inc. (WCN) (CIK 0001318220)
Date: March 17, 2010 · CIK: 0001318220 · Accession: 0001104659-10-014844
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File numbers found in text: 333-164402
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CORRESP 1 filename1.htm 237 Park Avenue New York, New York 10017.3142 USA Tel 212.880.6000 Fax 212.682.0200 www.torys.com March 17, 2010 By Hand & Via Edgar Pamela Long Assistant Director Division of Corporation Finance Securities and Exchange Commission 100 F Street, N.E. Washington, DC 20549 Re: IESI-BFC Ltd. Registration Statement on Form F-4 Filed January 19, 2010 File No. 333-164402 Dear Ms. Long: On behalf of our client, IESI-BFC Ltd. (the “Company”), we are responding to the comments of the staff of the Securities and Exchange Commission (the “Staff”) set forth in its letter of February 17, 2010 to Keith A. Carrigan, Vice Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the Company (the “Comment Letter”), with respect to the Company’s Registration Statement on Form F-4, File No. 333-164402, filed on January 19, 2010 (the “Registration Statement”). On the date hereof, the Company has filed Amendment No. 1 to the Registration Statement (“Amendment No. 1”) incorporating the revisions described herein. To assist the Staff in reviewing this letter, we will separately deliver to you and Ms. Haywood, by hand, a copy of this letter, along with a marked copy of Amendment No. 1 showing changes against the Registration Statement as originally filed on January 19, 2010. If you would like to receive additional copies of any of these materials, please do not hesitate to contact us. To facilitate the Staff’s review, we have included in this letter the captions and numbered comments in bold text and have provided the Company’s responses immediately following each numbered comment. Unless otherwise noted, page references in the text of this letter correspond to the pages in Amendment No. 1. Capitalized terms used herein and not otherwise defined herein shall have the meanings set forth in Amendment No. 1. General 1. Please note that we may have comments on the legal opinion, preliminary proxy card and other exhibits once they are filed. Please understand that we will need adequate time to review these materials before effectiveness. Response. The Company has asked us to advise the Staff that Exhibit 5.1 (opinion of Torys LLP as to the validity of the common shares of IESI-BFC Ltd. being registered), Exhibit 8.1 (opinion of Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP as to certain United States federal income tax matters), Exhibit 8.2 (opinion of Torys LLP as to certain United States federal income tax matters), Exhibit 8.3 (opinion of Torys LLP as to certain Canadian income tax matters) and Exhibit 99.1 (form of proxy card for the Waste Services, Inc. special meeting of stockholders) have now been filed with Amendment No. 1. In addition, the Company has filed a Waiver, dated as of January 8, 2010 (the “Waiver”), as Exhibit 99.2 to Amendment No. 1. The Company does not intend to file any additional exhibits to the Registration Statement. Calculation of Registration Fee Table 2. We note that the sum of the shares in footnote 1 does not equal the amount of shares to be registered in the table. Please revise or explain to us why the numbers are different. Response. The Company has revised the “Calculation of Registration Fee” table, which appears on the cover page of Amendment No. 1, to register 35,688,692 shares of Company common stock which represents the sum of (a) and (b) in footnote 1 to the table. 3. Please clarify whether the 5,753,740 shares you refer to in footnote (1)(b) of the fee table are intended to cover any additional shares that may be issued as a result of an exchange ratio adjustment for an excessive decline in IESI-BFC’s share price. Your current statement that these shares may be issuable in IESI-BFC’s “sole discretion” does not seem to be consistent with your disclosures about the merger agreement’s requirement to adjust the ratio in this circumstance. We understand that while IESI-BFC originally had the discretion to provide the additional consideration in the form of cash or stock or both, it later irrevocably waived its right to pay in cash. Response. The Company has asked us to advise the Staff that the 5,753,740 shares referred to in footnote (1)(b) of the “Calculation of Registration Fee” table are intended to 2 cover any additional shares that the Company may decide to issue in the event of a disproportionate decline in the Company’s stock price, as calculated in accordance with Section 6.3.5 of the Merger Agreement. Pursuant to Section 6.3.5 of the Merger Agreement, the Company is not obligated to issue any such additional shares and Waste Services Inc.’s (“WSI”) termination of the agreement under the circumstances specified in Section 6.3.5 does not trigger any obligation by the Company to pay damages to WSI. As such, the issuance of any such additional shares is at the “sole discretion” of the Company. The Company has revised the disclosure on pages 6, 7 and 86 of Amendment No. 1 to clarify the circumstances under which any such additional shares may be issued. The Company further confirms to the Staff that it signed a Waiver, in which it waived its right to provide any additional consideration (under the circumstances of Section 6.3.5 of the Merger Agreement) in the form of cash. The Waiver is filed as Exhibit 99.2 to Amendment No. 1. Letter to WSI Shareholders 4. Please ensure that the letter to WSI shareholders, which also serves as a cover page for the prospectus, contains all of the information required by Item 501 of Regulation S-K. In this regard, please disclose the total number of shares being offered by IESI-BFC in the merger. Response. The Company has revised the letter to WSI stockholders to contain all of the information required by Item 501 of Regulation S-K, including the maximum number of shares that the Company expects to offer in the merger. Inside Front Cover Page of the Prospectus 5. Please disclose (1) that the prospectus incorporates important business and financial information and (2) that this information is available without charge, as required by Item 2(1) and (2) of Form F-4. Response. The Company has revised the inside front cover page of the prospectus to provide the information required by Item 2(1) and (2) of Form F-4. Merger Consideration, pages 6 and 85 6. Where you discuss the adjustment to the exchange ratio to compensate for an excessive decline in the IESI-BFC share price, please state the share prices that 3 would trigger an adjustment where possible. For example, please give the actual closing share price on November 10, 2009, and if true, clarify that no adjustment to the share price will be made until the IESI-BFC share price drops below $10.64 (80% of the $13.31 closing share price on November 10, 2009). Response. The Company has revised the disclosure on pages 6 and 7 of Amendment No. 1 in response to the Staff’s comment. 7. We understand that WSI is not required to complete the merger if IESI-BFC does not increase the merger consideration following a share price decline as described in this section. Please clarify whether IESI-BFC has an obligation to increase the consideration, such that it would be in breach of the agreement if it failed to pay the increased consideration, and whether it would be required to pay WSI a termination fee if WSI was unwilling to complete the merger absent the adjustment. Please also clarify what WSI’s intentions are if IESI-BFC does not increase the consideration in this case. For example, are there circumstances under which WSI would waive this condition? If so, would WSI resolicit the shareholder vote? Please also consider whether any risk factor disclosure is appropriate in response to this comment. Response. The Company has revised the disclosure on pages 6, 7 and 86 of Amendment No. 1 to clarify that IESI-BFC is under no obligation to increase the merger consideration and that no termination fee or other damages would be payable by IESI-BFC or WSI if WSI was unwilling to complete the merger absent the adjustment. Thus, for example, if the price of IESI-BFC common shares over the ten trading days prior to the planned closing of the merger dropped below C$11.17 and such percentage decline from its closing price on November 10, 2009 (C$13.96) was more than 20% greater than the percentage decline (if any) of the relevant sector basket over the same period, then WSI would not be required to complete the merger unless IESI-BFC chose to increase the merger consideration by an amount equal to the percentage decline by which IESI-BFC common shares dropped below C$11.17. The Company has also asked us to advise the Staff that it has no way of currently knowing what WSI’s response may be in the event of a precipitous decline in the trading price of IESI-BFC common shares, which not only would have to be in excess of 20% but also would need to be in excess of 20% when compared to the trading price decline (if any) over the same period of a sector basket consisting of three publicly held companies in the waste service business (Waste Management, Inc, Republic Services, Inc. and Waste Connections, Inc.). 4 The Company has also asked us to further advise the Staff that it does not feel risk factor disclosure is appropriate given the remoteness of the risk of such a decline. As of March 15, 2010, the closing price of IESI-BFC common shares on the TSX was C$17.81, which represents a 27.6% increase over the benchmark trading price on November 10, 2009. Cautionary Statement Regarding Forward-Looking Statements, p. 24 8. Many of the statements in your registration statement relate to present facts or conditions, rather than to historical facts or future events. In light of this, the phrase in parentheses at the end of the first sentence in the first paragraph on page 24 and the words at the end of the fourth sentence of that paragraph (“and any other statements that are not historical facts”) appear to define forward-looking statements too broadly. Please make the appropriate revisions to this paragraph. Response. The Company has revised the first paragraph on page 24 of Amendment No. 1 in response to the Staff’s comment. The rights of WSI stockholders will change as a result of the merger, page 28 9. Please revise this risk factor to explain why there are risks associated with changes in the rights of WSI stockholders, and identify any changes that present specific risks you discuss. Response. The Company has revised the risk factor on page 28 of Amendment No. 1 in response to the Staff’s comment. IESI-BFC qualifies as a “foreign private issuer” in the United States, and is exempt from certain U.S. reporting requirements, page 30 10. We note that you introduce the risk that you would fail to be a foreign private issuer at the end of the captioned risk factor, which discusses the risks associated with being a foreign private issuer. Please discuss the failure to qualify as a foreign private issuer in a separate risk factor. In this regard, we note that the disclosures on page F-173 indicate that you have more than 50% of your assets located in the U.S. Your risk factor should explain that retaining your foreign private issuer status depends solely upon U.S. residents owning less than half of your outstanding voting securities, since more than 50% of your assets are located in the U.S. Please also disclose, if possible, the percentage of your outstanding voting securities you anticipate being held by U.S. residents after the transaction has taken place. 5 Response. The Company has revised the risk factor in response to the Staff’s comment by disclosing two separate risk factors on page 30 of Amendment No. 1. The first risk factor addresses the risk that foreign private issuers are permitted to file less information with the SEC than companies incorporated in the United States, and the second risk factor addresses the risk that IESI-BFC may lose its foreign private issuer status in the future. The second risk factor makes clear that more than 50% of IESI-BFC’s total assets are located in the United States and that foreign private issuer status thus depends on U.S. residents owning less than half of its outstanding voting securities. The Company has asked us to advise the Staff that at present it is unable to anticipate the percentage of its outstanding voting securities that will be held by U.S. residents after the transaction has taken place. Background of the Merger, page 54 11. Please elaborate on why the parties decided to resume discussions about a transaction in August 2009. Please also elaborate on the extent to which WSI discussed a transaction with the private equity firms in 2008. We note that WSI did not reach an agreement with either firm, but it is unclear whether the discussions were only preliminary, the extent to which due diligence was conducted, whether any terms or consideration were offered or discussed, and who terminated the discussions and why. Response. The Company has revised the disclosure to add the fourth and fifth full paragraphs on page 54 of Amendment No. 1 in response to the Staff’s comment. 12. Please explain how and when the parties arrived at the exchange ratio. Response. The Company has revised the disclosure to add the penultimate paragraph on page 54 of Amendment No. 1 in response to the Staff’s comment. 13. We note that WSI engaged CIBC to act as its financial advisor on November 9, 2009. Please elaborate on WSI’s method of selection of CIBC, as required by Item 1015(b)(3) of Regulation M-A. Note that this requirement is distinct from the requirement to discuss the qualifications of CIBC, which you appear to have done on page 65 under the heading “General.” Response. The Company has revised the disclosure on page 55 of Amendment No. 1 in response to the Staff’s comment. 6 14. We note that one of WSI’s board members was not present at the November 11 meeting when the merger was approved by WSI’s board. Please revise all of the references to the board’s “unanimous” approval of the merger throughout the proxy statement/prospectus accordingly. Response. In response to the Staff’s comment, the Company has removed all references to the board’s “unanimous” approval of the merger throughout the proxy statement/prospectus. 15. Please elaborate on the negotiation of the potential adjustment to the exchange ratio for significant declines in the price of IESI-BFC’s shares. Please also discuss why IESI-BFC committed to pay for any such adjustment in the form of shares and not cash after the merger agreement was entered into. Response. In response to the Staff’s comment on the negotiation of the potential adjustment to the exchange ratio, the Company has revised the disclosure to add the seventh full paragraph on page 55 of Amendment No. 1. In response to the Staff’s comment regarding the Company’s waiver that was entered into after the execution of the Merger Agreement, the Company has asked us to advise the Staff that the parties had entered into the transaction on the assumption that there were to be no appraisal rights under Delaware law but were subsequently advised by counsel that the option to provide additional merger consideration in cash could, under certain theoretical circumstances, potentially generate such appraisal rights. As a result, the Company executed the Waiver to remove this theoretical possibility and to affirm the ba