mixed emotions

I haven't posted in a while because I haven't had anything to say. I'm a long term holder who was smart enough to average down when AIM became BTR, dumb enough to average up when we were well over $1 last year because I thought we were heading for the moon, and smart enough to average down a few weeks ago because the price was stupid low. Last years $1m worth of BTR shares was only worth $150K a few weeks back, but I still bought more. Why?

Well,I still buy into the story. I have mixed emotions however. On the down side no one likes to see their assets diminish in value. On the upside I think a valuable lesson has been learnt by the company that should pay off in the long run.

As others have pointed out, the Perkoa Zinc mine is the little diesel backup motor in our electric Mumbwa sports car. A sports car that could easily turn out to be a super car with a little luck. Perkoa de risks BTR because it will allow us to keep developing Mumbwa without going into debt or doing any capital raising. The idea has always been to do all the due diligence on Mumbwa and present it to the market to do another free carry JV with a cash rich suitor.

So here's my point. It appears the contract with Glencore over Perkoa could have been negotiated better. The fact we have had to effectively give Glencore another chunk of Perkoa, because Glencore got the numbers wrong initially, annoys me considerably, and is the likely cause of the recent share price drop. I don't like "free carries" that cost you money. The good news is this expensive lesson will not have escaped the BTR board's attention. When the time comes to find a JV partner for Mumbwa I expect us to spoilt for choice and have a lot of iron clad clauses written into the contract that prevent the Perkoa mistakes happening again.

I'm still a little nervous Glencore will screw us some more over Perkoa, and I'm still a little nervous about the management changes. On the plus side however there is still the real possibility of Mumbwa going from being a great resource to a spectacular one, so that's pretty exciting. BTR is a long term play however and I don't expect it's real value to be determined for a few years yet. The traders will make or lose money depending on their skill and good luck to you. I'd like to see us long term investors eventually rewarded for our patience however. Time will tell.