exactly when did esg and sto start talking?

An extract from my post of 6 November 2010.

Yesterday?s announcement that "Eastern Star Gas has elected to delay its year end independent gas reserves review until early 2011" has done nothing to allay my fears that as ESG shareholders we may be seeing the emergence of this pattern [i.e. Arrow takeover] and that we may experience the full gamut of the shareholder softening up process play out over the coming months.

Any mug reading the announcement [OB 5 November 2011] can interpret the tone of the entire announcement as feigning positivity. There is no more effective way to dampen shareholder expectations and sow the seeds of doubt in shareholders' minds.

The main factor that concerns me, is the point at which management are "captured" by the predator. Again drawing on the Arrow experience, many shareholders felt that Shell and Arrow's management were not working as adversaries during the takeover process. Arrow's management did not engage with the shareholders and created a facade that the parties were engaged in a week of intense negotiations.

In the end, the general impression was that the deal had already been done between Arrow & Shell prior to announcement of the takeover bid and that Arrow's management spent more effort in the intervening period negotiating their own futures through the evolution of Dart Energy.

The question here is how much contact has ESG's management had with Santos? The general impression given by both companies is that they have very little contact. Santos however' has been very good at keeping a lid on things in the past 18 months. I hope DC and DK have not been spending too much time together.

Finally on a positive note, the best course of action is to take advantage of the circumstances. I am speculating we may see a few more dips in ESG's share price in the next few months (mirroring the lead up to the Arrow takeover) followed by the inevitable bid from Santos at a price similar to DB's 1 month VWAP + 40%.

Let?s hope I?m completely wrong.

End

The purpose of the post is not to blow my trumpet. Its just to point out that when you have an inkling that you might be getting screwed, you probably are.

It's been a well orchestrated process and the ESG shareholder's have been fighting with Paul Griggs in our corner.

The ESG board is in the red trunks.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=salvjc2Y6gc&feature=related

The SOA is the final tool to quell ESG shareholder expectations.