up coming 1/4 report, page-29

The problem is that BRL does not have any Investor Relations person.  On top of that, they refuse to do any conference calls, so we can't get our all questions answered satisfactorily.  In other parts of the world, those 2 are automatic red flags for any company...never mind an illiquid ASX listed NZ based coal company with a rotten history.  The sense I get is that management simply does not want to talk to anyone..except ExpatSingapore's beer buddies in Singapore.  

What BRL's management refuses to act on, or even admit, is that getting the share price up requires serious marketing.  Just talking to ExpatSingapore's beer buddies  (who already own half of BRL) is not going  to cut it.  Those Singapore funds are NOT buyers...they are sellers...all BRL management does by talking to only them, is to supposedly stop them from selling..which is turning out to be futile now.  But the need to attract new buyers is simply not understood by Tacon or Middleton and the rest.  Or at least they are not acting that way.  Beating your own drum is the phrase that comes to mind...which BRL is just not doing.

As a result, all we have is this Hotcopper forum to figure out what this management is really up to.  Talley's forcing a hedging would pretty much take the blame off BRL management.  But how does anyone confirm any such reality?  Any emails to management are very belatedly, replied to; sometimes never replied to.  

As far as brokers are concerned, I really doubt if they care about "hedging".  If anything, it makes their earnings forecast that much more difficult.  In my spreadsheet, I have them making NZ$90 million in operating cash flow in 2018-19 based on the forward curve of the met coal prices.  But now that they have already partly hedged, and almost certainly bound to hedge even more (managements will never admit to their original mistake), it is nearly impossible to come up with an accurate estimate.  Now all I can say is that in the next 12 months, they will make somewhere between  NZ$70 million and NZ$90 million, with the risk all to the lower figure.  Effectively, they may have lost us NZ$20 million with their misguided "hedging".

I would encourage people here to email management (since there is no IR person) and get any response.  And if you do, please share with us so that we can figure out what this team is really doing.

Re the court appeal...now that is a material development and they know exactly what the status of our appeal is.  But good luck finding out from management if that is indeed happening.  Oh  yes, you will be informed in due course (I bet that is what management will say)...which most likely suggests this quarterly announcement  will tell us.  I am pretty sure the appeal is on, since I took the trouble of calling up some NZ  lawyers...so I  am assuming that a Feb/March appeal is going to be heard.  Who knows...for once, maybe BRL has been correctly advised (legally speaking) and we may yet win the appeal on the technicality of the word "shipping"...but I am not assuming any win.