good deal or bad deal, page-21

Ok Thorburn, I'll have a crack. Perhaps others could join in too. The thing to remember is that the make-up of the board has changed during the last decade but here is what I recall as the major strategic decisions / actions.

Business Events..............

Bendigo mine:
1. Started in 'wrong' section of the mine (should have started in the north). Admittedly a condition of the licence but perhaps they could have pushed harder. Assessment: Unfortunate.
2. Assessed resources on a 'new' theory developed bu the then comapny geologist. Bad.
3. Undertook a capital raising just briefly before ceasing operations (first time around). Reality is that it saved the comapny's bacon but the reputation of the comapny was tarnished. Don't know how to 'rate' this.
4. Skip forward to recent times and the comapny is positioning to 'sell off' its interest (but retain an indirect holding). Fantastic move.

Henty:
1. Purchased it for a song with relatively little downside. Fantastic move because of diversification and it will continue to provide good cash flow for a number of years (despite the current, accurately forecasted, blip)

Beaconsfield:
1. With the benefit of hindsight a bad move but cut their losses early. Managed a 'bad' situation really well.

Goldstone:
1. Brought into waht is shaping up as a great asset.
2. Dissappointed that they did not hold-off a little longer and focus on this rather than executing the current merger (I know, I know.........lot's of people will disagree with this assessment).

Current merger:
Personally not excited by it but on the plus side it is another plank in the 'diversification' strategy which is an eminently sensible strategy.

Treatment of shareholders................

I don't think that the board sufficiently empathise with shareholders and I think this is due to their relative and absolute tiny shareholdings.

The buyback is just plain stupid!

I think tthat they should have paid a dividend and this would have bolstered the share price as well as rewarding long-suffering shareholders.

Conclusion:

Some pluses and minuses on the management / strategic front.

The company has some great assets (including the current merger target but I don't know about the structure of the transaction. Personally I would have preferred UML to take a 'stake' in a stand alone entity thereby isolating its other assets).

It will be interesting to see how the finances ar stuctured in the coming months and the extent to which the enabling of issung 25% in new shares will be handled.

Perhaps others would like to comment. Realise some may disagree (strongly) with my perspective.

Cheers