major bounce tomorrow, page-10

all aboard the aristocrat express Phil,

Great to see that you're on board Phil but don't be deceived into thinking ALL is highly speculative at these levels.

Firstly as Munch and I have been at pains to point out since ALL nose-dived, ALL has been well and truly oversold as boy-plunger style emotion and the panic selling herd-mentality wave overtook the tried and proven analysis of ALL's fundamentals.

As Munch pointed out Perpetual were a major buyer in the midst of the selling frenzy, at what have now turned out to be bargain basement prices.

These funds with substantial shareholdings in ALL together with their analysts will very much be enjoying the oppurtunity to offer their gratuitous 'expert' advice to the management of ALL, however I suggest that the necessary management changes will have already been decided upon.

Les Randall will pay these funds the obligatory 'lip-service', especially in view of the recent plunge, but the Funds have already acknowledged that Les is essential to ALL moving forward and that the blame for the recent debacle lies with his US colleagues.

Potential predators will be crunching their numbers all too aware that the longer any prospective T/O bid is delayed, the less likelihood of success at a relatively lower price.

Potential predators include US gaming groups IGT and Alliance Gambling as well as our own KP.

TabCorp is in the throes of bidding for Jupiters and as noted in todays AFR,why pay $1.3 billion for Jupiters which has a net profit of $70 million pa when you may get ALL for say $900 million, which makes $80 million and has a better growth outlook?

The main real obstacle to this strategy is that the Ainsworth family still own approx. 40% of ALL and there is no way they would ever consider selling at these levels.

At these levels ALL risks being knocked out of the S&P/ASX200 index, which can influence the weighting or preclude certain funds from holding ALL.

Therefore the Ainsworths and other loyal ALL shareholders have a few very good reasons to get ALL to levels that more accurately reflect its value and growth potential.

To summarise, tomorrow ALL will announce a 2002 NPAT of around $80m, Randall will apologise for recent events and probably sack the US CFO(Jayaraj) and/or the Head of Americas(Newburg), and then emphasise that the lower than expected US numbers are in line with the rest of the industry.

Les will then speak in glowing terms about the huge growth potential and stategic position of ALL to capitalise from an industry upturn.....which is sure to happen....you can bet on it!!

Subsequent to all of this, ALL will steadily move towards $2.50+ over the coming weeks