buy back, page-2

Hopper,

I thought it was a bit strange the news, something they haven't done before and explains why the dividend was at a lower ratio to profit than in the past. The normal way to support the shareholders is with a dividend and this $3M would have equated to another 2.3c on top of the existing dividend (say 5cps instead of 3cps). The only explanations that I can think of are that there were insufficient franking credits or this was a last minute thing - "what do we do with this lazy $3M"

I think the moves today have shown that it will stimulate the SP over the next month or two to the $1.20-$1.30 region.

I don't think it will sway the institutional buyers one way or the other.

I sold my shares at $1.15 prior to this news because the one cloud that is hanging over the company is the effect that a Labor Govt and the MRRT will have on new engineering contracts in the next year (another reason was to put the capital in another company that had more short term potential). For me anyway and you only had to see the drop from $1.10 to 80c in May when Rudd first bought out the tax as a reminder. Other than that the company seems to be going well. $1.25 is too rich for me to buy back in at this stage.