I also do have to wonder at the timing of this announcement coming one day after the announcement of the Thiess sale, and whether Cimic truly had no inkling that a $1.13bn asset on their balance sheet would be worth $43m, as recently as 9 October when they announced their September results and still included the asset at a value of $1.13bn, albeit with an unknown provision amount against it. And how their value could be so vastly different to the arbitration judgment. Surely during arbitration it would have become clear that the value they would receive would be much lower, even if they didn't know the exact amount. I guess we'll have to give them the benefit of the doubt? I still think they need to disclose the amount of the loss to be booked (we don't know as they don't say how much of their provision relates to this asset), it is very material, at least half of their equity, and it will let us know approximately how much equity they have left pre Thiess sale. One of my concerns is that it is even possible they will have negative equity if the provision amount was say less than $300m for this asset (pre Thiess sale). I'll do some research on the continuous disclosure requirements, I genuinely would have thought this would be required. If I was a shareholder (and I was considering it recently) I would be very put out by this.
CIM Price at posting:
$22.25 Sentiment: None Disclosure: Not Held
