Timee, Oracle and bcsiles:In a way we are all saying the same...

Timee, Oracle and bcsiles:

In a way we are all saying the same thing, but from opposite directions.

You are saying that management breached the trust of shareholders by either not being forthright with the nature and/or extent of the problems, or by lacking the competency to prevent the problems from arising in the first instance.

In essence, you are saying management didn't speak up until it was too late.

And I'm basically saying that as well, except that - without for one second being an apologist for FGE management - it is not management that I would be blaming for a project blowing up; rather, it's the very nature of the engineering construction beast that is to blame:

Namely, when you have a handful of projects and one of them goes badly wrong, or when several of them go a little bit wrong, then your profits disappear on you.

To state a tautology, management probably didn't know until they found out. By which time it was too late.

And the same for investors, retail or institutional.
No one could possibly see this coming.
And that's the whole point.

No one can ever foresee any black swan events, but the question we as investors should ask ourselves is:

"If the torpedo from left-field - that we had no idea was coming - hits our company, how bad will the damage be? Will the ship sink, or will it merely be sent off course for a bit, until the captain and crew re-set the direction to the original destination? Or, if somewhere in-between, what will it look like?"

I assure you it's not arrogance on my part that compels me to say far more on this particular situation than I care to.

Instead, I can assure you that, to swap the maritime analogy for a cricketing one, I know no one bats 100 every time in the investment game. We all go out for the odd duck here and there.
I have made many - and am certain to make many more - investing mistakes.

The idea is to resist the temptation to try to slog a ball over the head of a fast bowler when it is pitched up on a perfect line and length, and it is the fifth day of a test wicket that is breaking up.

It is in reminding others of this discipline, that I remind myself of it.

Cam