Excellent post. Thank you. I had not understood the significance...

Excellent post. Thank you. I had not understood the significance of the 2015 auction price.
Interestingly, the $US2,400/kg oil equivalent was the book value TFC used prior to increasing to $US2,800 in March 2015.
The oil needs to be extracted from the heartwood to achieve the market price for oil (currently $US4,500 per kg). I assumed the cleaned logs would sell at a discount to this price to reflect the cost to extract the oil and the value added component of the supply chain. I assumed the auction price of the MIS cleaned logs would be established via an efficient market and reflect a reasonable discount to the oil equivalent price.
The 2015 auction price of $US2,400/kg does not suggest this is an efficient market price. It suggests a lack of competitive bids and TFC is capturing a large value added component. The latter is very positive for me as a shareholder but a little concerning as a MIS grower.
It will be interesting to see if this is repeated in the 2016 auction (assuming not all growers have sold their lots to TFC).