Hi Marty....many thanks for posting the essence of your communication with Gary. I agree that they provide some reassurance. However, I am not sure why such a communication in the form of a letter to shareholders would not have been done well before today, or even well before Mohnish embarked on his seller's campaign. It is curious that Gary is willing to be candid when questioned, yet doesn't see the need to fill the information void created by him.
The picture is painted of a cyclical trap between TSI acquisition price, low TSN share price and need to fund acquisition of an EBITDA positive business that is also accretive to TSI. The question is how to spring the trap? The answer to that seems critical prior to AGM voting. IMO.
Even more confusing when he implies that our pursuit of our strategy is affected by our low share price, when it is clear that the absence of clarity on how the strategy was being pursued led to the low share price. I am also confused as to how a deal that made sense pre-monetisation is not now ready to be concluded, when the declared impact was minimal (2% if I recall) and that results are now almost back to pre-monetisation levels. I am further confused about how TSN can monetise any of its deals with Novatti and any future cyber-security related acquisitions, via TSI given the 'bad blood' that a failure to acquire is appearing to engender from TSI executives and allegedly from the major shareholder.
So...how do we spring the trap, I wonder? Perhaps by taking the punt on one of the release triggers? The only release triggers I see are:
- massively dilute to acquire a cyber-security company that delivers cash flow as well as strengthen our buying position with TSI;
- pull the trigger on TSI acquisition as it is now back to trend - recognising some dilution may be required to fund acquisition over and above available debt financing; and
- commence and sustain a robust, consistent and transparent series of market/shareholder engagement on strategy and tactics, with a view to reigniting investor confidence and hence SP.
I can not see point 3 as having a snowball's chance in hell if done in isolation - but in conjunction with either 1 or 2......perhaps! My preference is 2 and 3 now, and followed up with 3 within a few months. Time to get the activity levels raised here....let's have TSN as an aggressive and progressive (and hopefully valuable) business rather than an investment vehicle.
Thanks again Marty for soliciting this information and for posting it here to fertilise my thoughts.
