Baltimore Technologies is considering setting up a system with its broker that would enable thousands of small shareholders to sell shares in the firm at low cost.

In a letter to shareholders, the former FTSE 100 company says it is reviewing, with its broker Arbuthnot, ways to make it easier and cheaper for shareholders to dispose of their shares. The company has 6,000 Irish shareholders.

"We are aware that there are many shareholders with a small number of shares who may wish to sell but are dissuaded from doing so by share dealing costs," the firm outlines in its letter.

The firm gives no indication of the type of system that it may introduce but says it will update shareholders next year.

Tens of thousands of shareholders have lost money on Baltimore shares over the past three years as the firm's value shrank from several billion pounds at the height of the dotcom boom to under £40 million sterling (€57 million) last year.

The firm recently sold off its last remaining operating business - its core public key infrastructure business - to Entrust.

In its letter to shareholders, Baltimore Technologies, listed on the London Stock Exchange, said it expected to decide whether it will liquidate the firm and return the cash on its balance sheet to shareholders by next March.

Before deciding on the firm's future course of action, Baltimore will have to sort out its complex legacy of legal, tax and property liabilities, says the company.

The letter to subsidiaries says its board will make a recommendation to shareholders at its full- year results announcement.