Ann: Half Year Report and Accounts - 31 December 2017, page-39

Perhaps you misunderstand my perspective. Yes, some investors have been disappointed by past performance. But there's no point crying over spilled milk. I don't live my life looking in the rear view mirror, rather preferring to focus on the road ahead. For now, trading is suspended, so no further harm can be done, at least in the case of those who don't presently hold any stock. But seriously, ask yourself: how likely is it that the stock will trade again, & what are its implications?

Going by the vibe of the present directors, external accounting & auditing experts, financiers, investors, the admistrators that were involved, as well as ASIC, I think it very likely to trade again, otherwise they would not be expending the effort salvaging it as they have. At its core, it owns a valuable technology & has many clients in its pipeline.

If I am wrong & it never trades again, that doesn't affect anybody without open positions, doesn't affect anybody who has realised losses in the past, but only affects those presently holding the stock. Since that has been the status quo for a while now already, that doesn't change anything.

I understand that those presently holding the stock & having a pessimistic outlook want vengeance against the directors, but like I said before, that's never going to happen: they did nothing wrong or illegal. Rather, they relied on external accounting experts' advice & published reports in line with the accounting standards they were required to comply with at the time. Moreover, their auditors confirmed everything was kosher.

To their credit, when they discovered that the newer accounting standard may be more appropriate for their business model, which they weren't required to adopt until 1 July 2018, they took the the proactive measure of engaging another set of accounting experts for a second opinion, & implementing the new accounting standard retrospectively (which they didn't have to do), to address the criticisms some had directed at the old accounting standards, using BIG as their proxy punching bag.

If it does trade again, which is clearly their intention, and which I think is the most likely scenario, is the stock likely to rise or fall in value? Well, first of all, initially it may blip upwards or downwards - that is outside of anyone's control. But after the initial fluctuations are shaken out, I can't see it going any way but upwards, for the simple reason that there is no way the directors would allow it to resume trading unless they thought it was in good enough shape to appreciate. If they didn't think it was worthy of trending upwards on the resumption of trading, they wouldn't allow it to resume trading, as there would be no point. In that sense, if/when it resumes trading, I expect its trading characteristics to be not too dissimilar to an IPO, but perhaps without the corresponding extremes.

This analysis may not console anybody who has already crystallised losses on this stock in the past, but I'm not one of those, so those considerations are not relevant to me. Rather, I see it as an opportunity to buy value, admittedly not without some degree of risk, but without risk there is no reward.