Allied Farmers shares defied predictions by settling at an early base of 10c to 11c in their first week of trading.
With more than 1.9 billion new shares on offer after Allied took over the assets of troubled finance companies Hanover Finance and United Finance, predictions were for the shares to fall to 5c.
Shares were issued to Hanover and United investors at 20c as part of the deal.
The investors were not natural holders of shares, having invested in debt products.
However, it appears the flood of Christmas mail could be the reason why the shares have found the early base of 10c to 11c.
Many of the Hanover and United investors were on Thursday still awaiting their holder numbers from the share registry.
Forsyth Barr broker Peter Young said investors were taking positions in the stock for the long term with some relatively large buying taking place through the week.
Buy orders were placed on Thursday at 11c, 11.5c and 12.5c.
It had to be noted that the shares had halved in price since they were issued, falling to a low of 9.8c during the week, he said.
"People have had a bit more time to do their homework on the company and are buying it for the long term . . . I thought the base could have been a bit lower.
"Good luck to those people buying. I hope Allied Farmers can sort out its book and that the receivables keep coming in."
Although the volume of shares traded was large compared with when Allied only had 37.5 million shares trading, only 24 million shares had been traded through the week.
It was likely to be early next year before the bulk of the shares came on the market.
Two notices to the NZX also revealed the extent of the watering down for shareholders who previously had a major stake in the former company.
Allied Capital, the investment vehicle of Allied farmers managing director Rob Alloway and previously the largest shareholder, now owns 0.279% of the business, falling from 14.4%.
Former second-largest shareholder John Hynds, founder of pipemaker the Hynds Group, saw his share of the company fall from 12.64% to 0.251% even after he bought another 125,000 shares.
Mr Young said NZX rules dictated that the largest shareholders would have to be announced soon.
It was likely that a former Hanover investor would emerge as the largest shareholder.
Someone with $200,000 invested with Hanover would have received nearly one million new Allied shares this week.
