AC grabbed at the only chance he had (the Chinese), instead of mothballing the project.
The reason he couldn't choose that option is because AOH became a one trick pony with Roseby once we'd divested ourselves of Finland. This was a colossal mistake in retrospect.
Had he held fast with Finland, we would have been a going concern with Finland and been able to mothball Roseby. We also could have raised cash to finance Roseby once conditions improved.
The reason he didn't, was the debacle of Xstrata/Glencore with the former endorsing the project and the latter doing a total reversal. The Xstrata/Glencore debacle wasn't AC's fault, but he was pressured into returning some returns to shareholders with the sale of Finland. He should have held fast. But he was growing weary of the fight and the chorus demanding instant returns especially in here, was deafening. So he gave them what they wanted with the Finland sale, sort of.
He's a brilliant geologist and a very ordinary commercial strategist. This is the reality. He acknowledges this by pointing out the synergies between the two companies (he with multiple exploration successes, and they with their state of the art efficiency, commercial acumen and on-tap financier in Mitsuibishi).
Bearing in mind that AOH came back to CMMC in a weakened position after the situation with the Chinese became untenable.
I don't think we've got a heck of a lot of choice TBH, and I agree LT shareholders are being shafted.
CMMC get cash from us (bonus!), a depleted shareprice due to bad strategic calls next to nothing being paid for the colossal upside of the rest of the Cloncurry concession. All for them waiting around and being predatory.
No question about it.
Plus it will be years until we get a dividend as CMMC is highly leveraged with colossal debt and we still have to build the Roseby mine and pay it back.
Am I happy? NO.
Do we have any choice? Not really! I think institutional investors are going to be pragmatic about this.
(We would have to mothball Roseby, wait for Cu to start maxing out and hope we can find a ready partner with the skills and ability to do this. Then there's more delay).