It's the losses of investors that matter, nothing to do with what was misreported in the accounts in calculating the claim. The CA is about recovering actual $ losses that shareholders incurred, which is necessarily tied to the share price before (when the misleading information was given) and after (when it was disclosed).
You are correct that other factors come into play and that's part of the defence I imagine. I was just pointing out how the CA litigator would look at the potential loss to claim. They try to identify the maximum exposure period for these types of claims to maximise the loss book. The final amount would be much lower, I would guess.
SPO Price at posting:
93.5¢ Sentiment: Hold Disclosure: Held