Canwest restructuring?

Creditors of Canwest Global Communications Corp. (CGS) are bringing in a senior executive to lead a financial restructuring of the company, “possibly superseding chief executive officer Leonard Asper,” reported the Globe and Mail in a story quoted by Reuters and Bloomberg. Documents filed with securities regulators said the company’s creditors “have been granted several key decision-making powers in exchange for a recent $175-million financial lifeline, including the ability to install a chief restructuring officer in the coming weeks,” said the Globe.

Shareholders of the company who depend for their financial information on Canwest’s media properties — the media company with the largest number of readers in Canada — remain in the dark about these developments unless they also subscribe to the Globe and Mail, or read the Bloomberg and Reuters services. A search of Canwest’s web portal Canada.com for “CanWest Global Communications Corp” and restructuring turned up only one story, a piece from February about Canwest rival CTV, headlined, “CTV faces TV loss of $100M.”

Canwest shares have been bouncing up and down in the past few weeks as if on a bungee cord, jumping up to about 40 cents before plunging down to a record low on June 1 of 18.5 and rising back to the low 20s where they’ve long been hovering.