takeover extended to 31 january 2008, page-11

Thanks to jojo and Mineweb: (and Rosemary for starting thread)
http://www.mineweb.co.za/mineweb/view/mineweb/en/page36?oid=39005&sn=Detail

** LionOre was acquired earlier this year by Norilsk for C$27.50 a share, after a protracted takeover battle with Xstrata, which started with Xstrata's friendly offer of C$18.50 a share, and a 17.5% irrevocable lock-up.**

….. This discounts the theory that Xstrata are a shoe in by having a firm sales agreements with shareholders and option holders representing approximately 17.5% of Jubilee’s fully diluted shares (28th October 07)


The Variation of Takeover Bid announcements on Friday 7th interests me somewhat.

The first announcement was made at 9.52am before the market opened, which would make perfect sense.

The second Variation notice came at 3.10pm and required the shares to go into pre-open.
This doesn’t make much sense.

The second announcement came from the Legal firm: Mallesons Stephen Jaques.

Why the second announcement --- why the Law firm – why the pre-open.

I wonder a little if it was only in hindsight that Xstrata realized that extending the offer beyond 1 month gave shareholders the right to withdraw their acceptances. It makes no sense to me. They could have extended the offer to 17th January as a first move without risking the withdrawal of acceptances.

You could say big companies wouldn’t make a simple mistake like that, but we all know after being around the market for a while, that some of them make dreadful mistakes.

Xstrata are struggling.
They did not get the 50% to make the bid unconditional.
They risk people withdrawing acceptances, which I am sure they will when they have to wait until Jan 31st at the earliest to get their money.
They need to do more than extend the time.

JBM are still very much still a developing company.
At 13,000 ton/year and todays nickel price, $23 may sound okay.
But at 30 to 50000 ton and a metals bull market, we have another story.
Factor in capital gains tax, and the on going exploration and development potential of JBM ---- we either need more money or the advantages of a script bid to make an offer attractive.

A possible scenario: 2 BHP for each 3 JBM
BHP issue 87 million shares
We get the equivalent of $29, with no tax consequences and still fully engaged in resources potential.

We will wait and see what the future brings --- I am only guessing.

Regards, cy7