Shareholders in bombed-out software company Trintech must be just about ready to tear their hair out. That is if they have any hair left since the company's share spiralled from a dotcom frenzied high of more than $75 to the current situation, where Trintech is virtually a penny share.

The one-for-four consolidation of the shares on Nasdaq last week was supposed to put a floor under the shares but things have gone from bad to worse. Initially the consolidation had the desired effect and the shares rose from the rebased price of $2.28 to $2.81 in the last week of May.

Chief executive Cyril McGuire tried to give the shares a vote of confidence by pumping in more than $120,000 (€128,000) of his money to buy 150,000 of the shares (before they were consolidated). But that accounted for nothing once a dismal set of first-quarter results were produced.

So less than two weeks after the consolidation boosted the shares to $2.81 ($0.70 before the reverse split), the shares fell back to a low of $1.35 ($0.34) - an all-time low. Given that one prominent analyst, ABN Amro's Jemma Houlihan, caustically commented, "there is no sign the business is near stabilising", the negative reaction in the market came as no surprise, although the scale of the markdown did.

Now Trintech is not that far from falling back below $1. And that would mean that Trintech would have to consider a second reverse split if the sub-dollar valuation was maintained for a month. Not a happy scenario.