AERT Pays for Analyst to Cover Company

AERT picked up analyst coverage by paying for it, but that doesn’t necessarily mean the company will get positive reports, its analyst insists.

AERT is now being tracked by an analyst for Westergaard Broadcasting Network Professionals, a company founded by John Westergaard. The analyst following the company, Robert A. Thayer, says Westergaard previously worked in the bond industry and created his company based on Standard & Poor’s bond rating business.

“The way it works is the bond issuer has to pay a fee to Standard & Poor’s,” Thayer explains. “S&P then puts a rating on the bond issue.”

Westergaard, he explains, has a similar arrangement in which companies pay to ensure analyst coverage. Small companies like AERT often are not followed by analysts from any of the major brokerage houses simply because the companies are too small and too numerous for the limited number of analysts tracking companies.

Without analyst coverage, however, the companies frequently find they can’t get Wall Street’s attention. It’s that niche that Westergaard (which can be found online at wbn.com) hopes to fill.

The standard fee for companies is $48,000 per year.

“But just like at Standard & Poor’s, once you pay your fee, that’s it,” he says. “What keeps Westergaard honest? What keeps Standard & Poor’s honest? It’s the same thing, your integrity and your reputation. If you start writing analyses that’s not fair and impartial and accurate, then pretty soon you lose your readership because this is a free service.”