ASX LISTING RULES Guidance Note 14 (Section 17 – Responsibility for contents of announcements) is unequivocal:
“The legal responsibility for an announcement on MAP (ASX Market Announcements Platform) rests squarely with the person or entity submitting the announcement for publication.
While the MAO (ASX Market Announcements Office)does review announcements lodged with it prior to their release to the market, its review is necessarily quick and cursory and directed primarily to determining:
- whether the announcement relates to or affects a listed entity apart from the lodging party and therefore should be catalogued in the list of announcements for that entity on MAP; and
- whether the announcement is likely to be market sensitive and therefore warrants a halt to trading under ASX Operating Rule 3301(a).
It is not intended to be, and cannot be, a detailed review of the contents of the announcement, given the need for market sensitive information to be released to the market promptly. ASX therefore cannot accept, and expressly disclaims, any responsibility or legal liability to anyone whatsoever for failing to detect or prevent the release of an announcement that is inaccurate, incomplete, misleading, defamatory or otherwise defective.”
IMO the following self-inflicted errors, corrections, revisions, amendments, clarifications and retractions are doing a thousand times more damage to the reputation and share price than someone expressing their frustrations (or venting) on HotCopper.
| So far … published announcements:
| #
|
|---|
| 1 | Amended
| 3
|
|---|
| 2 | Revised
| 3
|
|---|
| 3 | Retraction
| 2
|
|---|
| 4 | Clarifying
| 2
|
|---|
| 5 | Response to ASX Query Letter
| 2
|
|---|
| 6 | Breach
| 1
|
|---|
| 7 | Correction
| 1
|
|---|
| 8 | Updated (2 errors in Directors’ Declaration, page 110 of the 2018 Annual Report, namely “condensed” and “half”)
| 1
|
|---|
| 9 |
| 15
|
|---|
IMO the Company Secretary and Board should have exercised a lot more care and diligence to ensure that the information in announcements was accurate before submitting them to ASX.
The above published announcements have to be an embarrassment for Mark Stewart, as these issues keep happening under his Chairmanship (of the Board and the Audit & Risk Committee).
I was under the impression Simon Gray (the new Company Secretary) was appointed by the Board on 29 January 2019 to fix these issues and stop the bleeding.
KPIs set by our Board for Management must include zero tolerance forerrors, corrections, revisions, amendments, clarifications and retractions in publishedannouncements. I will be raising this at the next general meeting, as it has been an absolute disgrace and I can’t see it abating.
Some days, I don’t believe the Board and Management do understand the rules. The hash up (verb - to make a mess; mutilate almost beyond recognition) of the Corporate Governance Statement (4 times to get it right) and Appendix 4G (3 times to get it right) are classic examples.
"If you can't do the little things right, you will never do the big things right" - William H. McRaven
DYOR
Full List (so far):
5 Apr 2019 Grants Basin Iron Ore Exploration Target –Amended
25 Mar 2019 Retraction of Non-JORC Compliant Information
14 Mar 2019 Revised Corporate Governance Statement and Revised Appendix 4G
13 Feb 2019 Corporate Governance Statement and Revised Appendix 4G
24 Jan 2019Response to ASX Query Letter (on 21 Jan2019 Grants Iron Basin assay results)
16 Jan 2019Response to ASX Query Letter (follows on from 11 Dec 2018 breach)
16 Jan 2019 Terms of Unlisted Options Clarifying Announcement
28 Dec 2018 Grants Iron Ore Basin Retraction of Social Media Statements
21 Dec 2018 Change of Director’s Interest Notice – Giles – Amended
14 Dec 2018 AGM Results – Cover Letter Correction
11 Dec 2018 Notice of Inadvertent Breach of ASX Listing Rule 10.11
7 Dec 2018 Directors and Remuneration Report Clarifying Announcement
7 Dec 2018 Appendix 5B – 31 October 2018 – Amended
6 Nov 2018 Annual Report to Shareholders – 2018 – Updated
(20min delay)