Adel,Well, from a timing perspective, exiting at 50c was a good...

Adel,

Well, from a timing perspective, exiting at 50c was a good move given you can re-enter (at least in the short term) in the late-30s / early-40s. Not bad at all if you are a speculative investor.

Here are my thoughts on the points you raised.

1. To my knowledge, the company never mentioned WestLB. The media came up with this name and ran with it right until the last minute when John Durie in the Australian broke the news that CBA was part of the delay. To this day, I am unsure as to whether anyone has confirmed/denied which party was responsible for the $200m. In fact, it could have been CBA all along. I am happy to be corrected if someone can publish a credible source.

There were undoubtedly delays around the extension but those of us who have been around a while know that this kind of thing just happens - it's painful and time consuming but it is part of business. The delays could have been due to any number of reasons, including sheer complexity of what they were trying to achieve. The company secured a longer extension that anyone expected, on an interest margin lower than expected but the market focused on the fact that it took them 8 days longer to achieve.

As to whether it raises ethical questions, I don't believe it does. Every relevant regulator in the land would have been watching Centro over the past couple of weeks and I have no doubt they were in regular contact with the ASX and ASIC to keep them appraised. Centro have engaged a heavy hitting (expensive) legal team and under the threat of litigation, there is no way they are going to knowingly put a foot wrong. The compliance and corporate relations officers from the lenders would have wanted to vet everything along the way as well.

The 'big' announcement came out last Thursday after close. If Centro had made EXACTLY the same announcement on the morning of 30th April, would everyone have reacted the same way? Who knows, but I doubt it.

2. From a purely commercial perspective, I have no doubt Centro competitors would be hoping for a less-than-favourable outcome in the hope that they may be able to pick over any assets. At the 1/2yr presentation the company said it had been approached by a number of local LPTs regarding assets so this would make sense.

I think it is important to remember the magnitude of the sums involved when considering hidden agendas from lenders.

If Centro falls over, $6.6bn of loans will be in jeopardy which will require thousands upon thousands of hours and unbelievable expense to sort out. There will be in-fighting between the 16 lenders to the group and no-one will get their pound of flesh until the administrator says so - then it may actually only turn out to be 4 ounces anyway.

GR has also said a couple of times that the banks are not putting any pressure on for a sale. If there was a hidden agenda, this would not be the case. In fact, not only would the banks be pressuring, they would be telling the company who to sell the assets to!

3 and 4. I have now spoken to Investor Services twice today. Once I posted about earlier and then I received a call back this afternoon, which I had requested. They were quick to focus on the debt extension to 15th Dec and as I said earlier, the May 30th deadline seems to be purely a 'finalisation' of some paperwork and inter-lender agreements. I have grilled them twice on these points.

Remember that lenders lose all their security if the deadline is not met - we may be anxious about the deadline but I'd say their are some bankers putting in overtime to make sure it happens. If I read it right, that's $2.7bn of debt that becomes unsecured overnight if the deadline passes and the arrangements are terminated. Believe me, we will see the swift departure of senior or group-executive level bankers if they are forced to take a loss on this. I doubt it will happen.

Finally:

We have seen a deluge of financially unsophisticated drivel in this forum over the past few days and the Investor and HC body count just seems to keep rising as a result. The credibility of the CNP HC forum has dropped further than the CNP share price in my opinion. It's a real shame for those of us who view this as a useful resource.

It is important to research using multiple sources (away from HC, especially at the moment) and draw your own conclusions on whether to invest in CNP or CER. If you are a long-term investor, remember that you are not buying a 3-letter code whose price bounces around irrationally all day every day and on which you can make a quick buck. You are buying a piece of a business - if the business does well, you will do well.

Do not underestimate what Centro has achieved thus far, despite the economic environment, adverse media and everything else capitalism has thrown at them.