I don't have any NMS shares but I've been keeping an eye on it...

I don't have any NMS shares but I've been keeping an eye on it because sometimes great opportunities can arise from great chaos. This company has certainly achieved great chaos but, so far, the opportunities are not leaping out at me.

I'm really sorry for those that have lost money on this. I may not own NMS but I've had my own accidents.

Just following up on beejay's point about the minimum subscription - under the Corps Act the subscription money has to be placed in a trust account for subscribers until minimum subscription is reached. It is an offence to take it out. Of course the risk is they have four months to desperately scrabble around to reach minimum subscription if they don't get it all under the initial offer. Your money stays in the trust account.

The sticking point for me is what imho appears to be the incompetence of the board. These fees are rediculous. If the minimum amount of $60M is raised the fees (as stated in the prospectus) will be $5.4M. WOW - 9% with no contribution to the cash earning potential of the business. Also, this statement must have been drafted by a lawyer because I think the actual fees are materially higher. This defies rational explanation. Look at the fees to Euroz and Patersons. A $500K corporate advisory fee and a whopping 6% management and cap raising fee when it is not underwritten. On top of this there is also payment for legals and other 'out-of-pockets'. There is something fundamentally wrong with this amount. It reminds me of the massive fees paid to financial advisers to get their clients into the tree farm schemes because the underlying business model was flawed. Also note that Euroz has been paid $2.06M in the past two years for broking services. It would be more profitable for NMS just to invest in Euroz.

We come to the bank's egregious fees. If minimum subscription is reached the bank receives a fee of $2.4M for granting the facility extension from Dec to March even though this is on top of all the interest and fees that continue to accumulate in the meantime - at an increased margin. Now as I understand it, if shareholders and investors don't bail out the company the bank's loan will be impaired. So the shareholders are going to bail out the bank. So that there can be no doubt about the bank's contempt for shareholders, the investors and shareholders will be charged a whopping 4% of minimum subscription for the privilege of getting the bank out of its problems.

I'm not sure how the company arrives at the figure of $5.4M for expenses if minimum subscription is reached.

The fee of the JLM's is $4.1M + legals,etc (maybe $50K) = $4.15.
the bank = $2.4M (possibly the bank's legals on top of this)
company's advisers = $350K

To me that adds up to $6.9M which is 11.5% of the minimum offering. That's appalling. Couldn't management say to the bank "if this doesn't go through your dead so forget about any further fees".

Same with Euroz. How many clients have they put into this. If it goes down it will not look flash.

I don't know all the details of the Vendors (security arrangements, etc) but unless their position is iron clad I would have thought there was an argument along the lines "Guys we are all in the deep do-do here so take a haircut or you'll get nothing."

There is a quaint little clause that deals with the former CEO's claim for a termination payment. Am I dreaming or are the directors presently having an actual discussion with the former CEO as to how much the company owes him.

I don't want to deter people from shaking the tree but in my view no work will be done on this company by ASIC. The way it typically works is that ASIC does nothing meaningful to prevent the loss of shareholders funds even in very egregious circumstances. The company goes into liquidation. The liquidator gets hold of all the company's records. If there has been misfeasance it gets reported to ASIC. If the hard evidence is there and it has been given to ASIC something might be done about it. That is the most that can be hoped for. I'm not making this comment specifically in relation to NMS, however (speaking generally) in Australia the only thing a dishonest company executive or manager has to fear is liquidation.

Even if I thought the company had good prospects under new management and with low debt, this is all too stinky for me. I'm not giving my money to any of these people.