Unfortunately, I have seen this story play out way too many...

Unfortunately, I have seen this story play out way too many times before with asx listed companies. I can assure you that Tim and Brett must be very very confident of meeting all those performance hurdles otherwise they wouldn’t be asking shareholders to approve the performance shares being issued.

They can spin it all they like regarding these performance shares being at ‘risk’, there is very little or next to no risk, trust me, these are pretty much guaranteed and directors want a free lunch here. It is almost offensive to me that at the eleventh hour, they would try and slip these performance shares into a general meeting. Working in corporate finance, I have seen it all before so they don’t fool me with their at risk wording and calculations - blah blah blah. The amount of times I see companies issue ‘performance shares’ and it is almost uncanny the amount of times they seem to miraculously meet these performance objectives every time.

I have been involved in grant applications for clients of mine and I can assure holders that in most instances you aren’t putting in for the grant unless you are extremely confident you meet the grant requirements to begin with, the reason being is that you can spend considerable amount of time and effort going back and forth with departments and if you aren’t successful, it is embarrassing having to go back to a client saying it took us XYZ amount of months and this is how much it will cost you but we weren’t successful. Tim and Co have been dealing with the grant department for quite sometime and would be pretty darn sure by now whether it is going to be granted or not, maybe they just aren’t sure of the quantum of $$ at this stage of the game but trust me you pretty much know whether you are going to receive grant monies or not prior to being officially told you are.

Although I have been a big supporter of management and how they operate the business and conduct themselves, I can’t support the issue of performance share resolutions and encourage other shareholders to vote no. My pet hate is management sticking their noses in the trough but especially so close to the finish line regarding grant outcome.

Both Tim and Brett are paid handsomely for their roles at a small cap company who is yet to turn a profit. They also wouldn’t be paying for a cent regarding travel costs overseas so fair go to shareholders here boys. Don’t forget who pays your wage. Not understating their work done to date, but that is what they are paid to do, meet those types of objectives for shareholders who are the owners of the business. It’s not like they are being paid under market value and using shares to supplement their remuneration like some other companies. That would be fair enough, I would have no dramas approving these types of performance shares but not in this instance. Cheers, CP.