This situation makes for a good analogue for the end game for...

This situation makes for a good analogue for the end game for SWF [*], in my view:

061th6k08h74fj.pdf (asx.com.au)

MEA and SWF have a number of things in common.

1.   Neither a great quality business.
2.  The synergy benefits under the ownership of each of these companies by an industry incumbent are meaningful.
3.  Capitalising those synergy benefits results in significant valuation uplift compared to their current market values.
4.  More than one-third of their market value is cash-backed.
6.  They are both trading at sub-5x EV/EBIT multiples
5.  They are both at, or near, the bottom of their business cycles.

Of course, being acquired is not the only end game for SWF.  It's directors and management could make yet another attempt at "growth". But that has been tried before, and it didn't work - all that ended up happening is the company torched a whole hill of shareholder capital for no discernible gain.

So, if the SWF Board members were serious people, and understood the path to salvaging some of the shareholder value that disappeared over the past 4 years, they would do the mature thing by hanging a "For Sale" sign outside the company's entrance, just as the MEA directors have done.

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