I think people are overemphasizing the grab-bag of samples from Mulligan as some kind of marketing and methodological screw-up. I'm not sure if that can explain everything that's going on, especially with what other projects MEI has, and what is happening more widely with cobalt explorers/developers on the ASX.
On those samples: they were taken on the initial site visit after acquiring the tenement. I'm guessing they probably didn't bring a digger and truck to take a trench sample. They didn't have the historical information, I assume, where that previous 8 tonne sample exactly came from. I assume they had a bunch of hand tools, some basic maps, and limited time. What they sought was some kind of confirmation of the previous vein ore, which they found and reported. It looks arbitrary and random, but the purpose of the exercise, it seems to me, was confirmation, not exploration. So to interpret this as incompetence and a failure is to grade it too harshly.
Again, the Midrim work is mainly confirmation work with drill hole twinning, to prove the historical results, and step out drilling to test for extensions, as ainsleym and binwood have rightly pointed out. Today's announcement was positive to those ends. All this confirmation work is consonant with a period and the purpose of due diligence. The historical data is available online to anybody, including TK, who liked it so much he bought in. The cobalt exploration is a potential upside to the polymetallics already in the bag, which came with the geologist who originally helped to explore them.
This is all already outlined in the post "MEI fundamentals". The only reason, imo, this dismal conversation is being carried out is because the share price is falling, and people are scrabbling for reasons to explain poor price performance, with egos, expectations, disappointment, and rationalization all mixing in the bitter cocktail of pessimism. Well, there is the company, and there is the "ticker", there is the sector, and there is the market, and then there is society and the investing public. The company cannot control all of this stuff, and I do not believe that the market is always "right" either. Isn't value investment based on the very notion that the market is often wrong, within a given timeframe? (and TA is based on the notion that reality doesn't matter). That the short term is dominated by individual aims and cunning, and the Buffets just have to stick it out while the Composite Men play their games? If I were a soph that participated in the placement, I'd probably be aggressively averaging down my holding right now, probing supply. How low will people sell? We'll be finding out soon I imagine.
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