In there quarterly they said they were expecting to finalise the...

In there quarterly they said they were expecting to finalise the PNG deal in March, so next month. Difficult to know who the buyer will be, selling 40% of their share of assets they currently own 50-60% of is not an obvious target for the majors who like to have big positions and ideally operatorship.

Existing players in the asset could seek to increase their stakes, but that would effectively hand them control, Talisman would likely become the operator with all the cost over runs and delays that will likely entail.

Difficult to call. Good thing is the assets are well positioned to go into the PNG LNG project or a new forelands Talisman (or other) gas aggregation led project. I would consider Santos to be a potential bidder along with the Chinese/SE Asian groups.

On the shorting, may very well just be hedging, but the convertible nature of the notes means you are not net short so if the price runs hard as you would still be in the money through the options which represent a far large part of the company (10-20% depending on where the strike price lands) compared with the total short position (typically moving 2-3% of current shares on issue)