I try not to over complicate it. Perseus holds all the aces....

I try not to over complicate it. Perseus holds all the aces. Silvercorp probably has put significant effort in already so might want to throw another improved scheme, but per what I said above, they are constrained. They might have a ceiling at 65-70 cents. Then Perseus come over the top in shares and cash.

One thing Perseus probably doesn't want is for this to drag on for months and months a la Cardinal. They want the project to move forward quickly ('an optimal and expedited pathway"). They want the ounces. Having another scheme meeting to nowhere on January 18 is a joke, and may be an attempt to force Perseus to place a formal competing offer. You'd think that Perseus were probably doing informal due diligence on the project since the Silvercorp offer in August (or since they canned Meyas Sands in May-June).

A JV might speed a deal up but I reckon Perseus would rather wait a few months instead of setting up a JV arrangement that would complicate ownership and seemingly deliver few benefits to Perseus (other than capex risk mgmt).

I like that this is happening in the backdrop of a rising gold price. It allows the companies to offer more from rising equity and get caught up in the FOMO like with Cardinal. Sometimes I think if the Cardinal dealings took place in 2021/2 rather than 2020 how much different the outcome would have been.