Tamz took some of the words out of my mou, er, post. If you call most small to medium size companies and say you're a shareholder (you don't actually have to be one), you'll usually have a director talk to you. If it's obvious that you have a genuine interest in the company they'll usually spend a bit of time talking with you. Tamz beat me to saying you're definitely not going to chat to the board members of BHP etc, but you'll usually speak.to someone pretty high up, and this surprises most people at first (sure surprised me when I was on my 20s and tried calling a company I had shared in for the first time).
Something Tamz didn't say is that every single time you ever talk to a company director and tell them you're a shareholder, regardless of what company it is, you will come away from the conversation feeling like the company is amazing and you should put money into it/keep holding. This is literally the job of the person who talks on the phone to shareholders. If they aren't fantastic at making people feel that the company is brilliant, they won't be talking to you. I very strongly recommend any shareholder to pick the worst two or three ASX-listed companies they know of, call them on the phone and tell them you're a shareholder and ask a few questions and ask for updates etc. You will probably come away from those conversations feeling like you want to buy stock. These people are paid huge salaries and convincing you that the company is great to invest in is their expertise. You will never, ever have a director talk to you in that context and convince you the company has problems or you should sell, even when Blind Freddy and his dead friend Dug know the company is a lost cause.
We see plenty of people on Hot Copper talking about their phone and email conversations with company directors, raving about how confident they are. It is basically meaningless. The main actual value in making those calls as a shareholder is asking them to clarify things in announcements you found ambiguous. Some shonky companies will give out information they shouldn't, often outright lying, but any half respectable company (TNT very much qualifies) will not give you any new information which isn't already in company announcements. They'll make you feel great, they won't lie, but for most people it does more harm than good. Again, I strongly recommend giving this a go with several companies, including some you know are bad, then try it on companies you hold including TNT.
If you just want to live in an echo chamber and not see reality, ignore all of my posts, only listen to the bulls, disregard what I've said here, call TNT and enjoy.
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