Ann: Trading Halt, page-38

"Hi madamswer, I admit my comments were influenced by the the Bell Rock letter and some analysis on HC around the quality (and resultant mix) of the met coal assets. Also, Paul Flynn's salary, as a comparison to other coal mining CEOs and the heavy selling of shares by management into a buy back, all contributed to my negative outlook. II has written some fairly negative articles regarding management decisions at WHC as well."

Yeah, but that's conflating two unrelated issues - how much management are being paid, and the scope for this to be a good deal for shareholders.

As for Bell Rock (BR) and II, they - just like everyone - have their opinions (driven, I daresay, by their own commercial interests). But, again, I can't understand how anyone can form a view without seeing the details.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not bagging any of them, but I'm unaware of BR's investment track record and the folk at II certainly don't bat 100 every time they analyse a company.

(In fact, in an ironic way, BR's vocal concerns have probably done WHC shareholders a favour by applying a sort of preemptive bunsen burner under the collective derrieres of the WHC management and directors, preventing them behaving like drunken sailors in the negotiations.

My inner game theorist tells me that I shouldn't be surprised if the exercise was largely intended to manage the expectations of the folk representing BHP in the discussions, for example, as in:

WHC Maangement: "We'd really like to buy your mines, BHP, and you know that we'd be diligent and responsible operators of them, thereby absolving you of any reputational contamination down the line. But gee, as you can clearly see, we're coming under pressure to not pay too much, so how about bringing your price down even more? Oh, and also, how about some nice vendor finance from you so that we avoid having to raise capital from WHC shareholders, because as you can see, they aren't having a bar of it?"

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