On Aug. 31, the White House said North American Blue Energy Partners “has granted” the Office of Strategic Capital a 35 percent equity stake in its corporate parent. It said the stake would cost taxpayers nothing and could be worth hundreds of billions of dollars. Those are administration claims. The fact sheet did not include the executed agreement.
The company’s release used different words. It said the government would hold “rights to a 35% stake,” while NABEP would retain operating control.
A stake is ownership.
Rights to a stake may become ownership.
English has performed harder jobs. It should not have to perform this one without paperwork.
The New York Times, citing people familiar with the agreement, reported that the government would receive an option to take as much as 35 percent through warrants. Warrants provide the right to buy shares at a set price. The Times said these would be penny warrants, convertible for very little money, often one cent.
That is not how other accounts described it. NBC and NPR said the agreement “will give” the Pentagon office a 35 percent ownership stake, attributing that information to the White House. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum described it as 35 percent ownership obtained “for basically investing nothing,” according to his Newsmax interview.
So the government has a stake.
Or it will get one.
Or it has rights to one.
Or it has an option to buy one.
These descriptions may concern the same arrangement at different stages. They are not necessarily contradictory. They are not interchangeable, either.
The parties also say the government will receive preferential access to 20 percent of the company’s production at cost. Again, neither public announcement includes the contract establishing those terms.
No executed agreement, warrant, term sheet or ownership record appears in the materials released or reported so far. The available record therefore does not independently establish whether shares have already changed hands or whether the government holds a cheap right to acquire them later.
We have the percentage.
We have several verbs.
The document that could choose among them remains unavailable.