Other potential bidders would include the institutional owners...

Other potential bidders would include the institutional owners of the big wrap accounts. Westpac (they need to fix the lame dog that is BT Panorama before any sane person will buy it) or the private equity guys who own a slice of the CFS platforms (which are also way behind technology-wise)...outsourcing the technology development to Praemium would be cheaper and more productive than what either has managed to do historically.

BT has spent ridiculously huge amounts of money on Panorama and achieved very little, they should have bought Praemium years ago. CFS needs to overhaul FirstWrap and they could probably use some help with FirstChoice also. Macquarie could also potentially bid to upgrade its Wrap account.

AMP? IOOF? Iress?

The Heines and netwealth should want this PPS merger pretty badly, as there is a lot to be gained from it, but they're tight-fisted, so will need a nudge from HUB or one of these other parties to pay the true value.

$1.70 is closer to the fair value mark here.