all paths lead to confrontation with santos, page-5

King,

An excellent point which does support the theory that at that time now deep in the past back in July 2009 the CSG acquisition market still looked HOT & STO quickly bought into the ESG/JV double as both assets had very willing sellers, to try and make some money for their GLNG Capex by being taken out by one of the big aggressive "other bidders" stalking the plains, which of course never eventuated.

So STO were stuck with the ESG/JV - the music had stopped.

If you consider Occam's Razor to be a reasonable philosophy then the above may be the Real Truth , but we try to over complicate it inferring all sorts of strategic deep thinking when it was simply that the ESG/JV was one of the few big resources left. The opportunistic "Smart" predator decided to snag it for a quick high profit on-sale if outbid or just hold it for later on to do with as they please. The onus is on ESG to break out if it can.

Of course I may be wrong, and I may never know the true reason for STO's actions

Cheers