There were quite a few interesting response to the questions at the AGM. Two stuck out, in particular, for me.
First, someone asked a question about the presence of a large "unnamed" shareholder on the registry. Stuart said they cannot reveal the names of anonymous shareholders if they have not exceeded the 5% holding threshold. He did, however, say a very large "unnamed" shareholder had voted against quite a few of the shareholder proposals (thus revealing their large single holding). He said this is frustrating as the company is more than willing to engage large shareholders on a one-one-basis to address any concerns. But for whatever reason, they have not done so. Rather, they have simply decided to throw mud. From my perspective this is SN telling us that a large "unnamed" holder (i.e. Gina) has decided to hide their position (i.e. they do not appear in the Top 20) and is trying to cause trouble. This conforms with the article in The Australian and the share trading activity we've seen of late.
Second, SN said Gina is still digesting the rapid transaction with MIN, and Strike, as a good JV partner, is giving her time to analyse her new assets. He said, hwoever, Strike is not willing to be "patient" forever. This is interesting, first of all, because SN has essentially confirmed the rumours that Gina is the cause of the hold up. Wiseman, the Macquarie analysts has been saying this for quite some time. (How he knew, I don't know???)
It is also interesting because SN was essentially making a veiled threat by saying "there's a limit to our patience." First of all, it's ballsy to say this to your JV partner and Australia's richest woman. It also begs the question: what recourse does STX have ? Litigation to invoke their operationship powers (potentially resulting in a messy legal battle)? Or selling WE to someone else?
At the same time, however, SN said they are willing to discuss integrating Gina's new "northern assets" into the WE plan. This pretty much confirmed another thing we've speculated about on this board. It says to me, they are willing to talk about building a larger gas plant in WE to process some of Gina's other gas. So, it seems clear STX's preferred option is to work together on a WE plant. But failing that...see above.
All of this tells me, things are getting a little tense between the parties, and there's a lot going on behind the scenes. The board is clearly in defensive mode. All of this raises the probability that some of the speculation we've had on this board is "on the money" i.e. that Gina has in fact built a position and is using that power to influence the company (by voting against board proposals without prior consultation) ; that a low ball offer has already been made and rejected (you'd imagine the logical time to do this would be before buying MIN's assets), and; that the board is determined to hold onto WE unless a reasonable offer is made. Failing that, the Board will wait it out, and focus on our other exciting projects: Walyering, SE peaker plants, and Ocean Hill.
The sell-off during the meeting could be due to SN's comment, essentially confirming Gina is holding things up. Equally likely, it is the "unnamed" large shareholder dumping shares to make the board look bad in lieu of a lowball offer.
People may read between the lines in different way to me, but from my perspective SN revealed as much as he can without getting in trouble.
I will be holding tight until all is revealed.
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