This from...

This from http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,23989404-5003680,00.html



A MELBOURNE hedge fund has bought a substantial stake in Adelaide energy company Sapex, in a bid to profit from its planned $104 million merger.

MM&E Capital began buying Sapex stock on June 12 - the day it announced it had agreed to merge with the Brisbane-based Linc Energy. The fund has built a 5.68 per cent stake in Sapex.

MM&E managing director Tom Elliott said yesterday: ``We're interested in the outcome of the deal and by having a substantial stake in the company we're in a position to exercise some influence. We think it's a pretty interesting bid, but it looks like quite a cheap one too.''

Sapex managing director Andrew Andrejewskis said he understood 75 per cent of acceptances were needed to get the merger across the line at a shareholder meeting next month.

Mr Andrejewskis said his advisers believed the fund was trading for the arbitrage profits once the merger went through.

``The indications are we shouldn't be too concerned about it,'' he said. ``I've got advisers who keep telling me to take it easy.''

Sapex owns seven petroleum exploration licences covering 65,000sq/km of the Arckaringa Basin in central South Australia as well as two mining exploration licences.

Its licence areas are prospective for oil and gas as well as coal seam gas.

Coals-to-liquids company Linc has underground coal gasification projects in Queensland and was identifying suitable fields on Sapex's licence areas.