the market dance

I do like to see an NZer post something. Especially when it is something quite interesting like this. I'd better be careful not to make too many comparisons but my thoughts would be - if it happens over the ditch, it happens here (gee at least NZers were free settlers) and the whole system facilitates the game playing. We've talked about it often enough on the board so this is not really reopening the conversation on whether it happens but how.

I don't have a stomach for all the TA - not because it isn't potentially useful but because it does my head in. Sort of that lies, lies and damn statistics - and this is with a million apologies to ARMCH who I would prefer not to offend as I greatly respect what he writes - his posts always seems so very level headed to me, though reading them recently even he sees to be thrown by the AJX action. It also does my head in because my bent is to understand what humans do, why they do it and how. TA seems to me first to be based on the principle that past behaviour predicts future behaviour - which doesn't really allow for anomalous or out of the box situations - and then because of that, generates what is known as the Pygmalion effect - it gets the treatment based on the prejudices, beliefs and expectations that the charts create and thus reinforces the views that the charts are correct.

But then last week the charts seemed to be more hopeful - and now.......? wham.! So that would seem to belie what I was just saying.

I sat and silently read hotcopper over the last few days and occasionally drew a heavy breath of amazement. It is of course possible that posters decide to do something more useful with their lives than simply post on hotcopper - even Pinto and I manage to. But there seemed to be something weird going on. Apart from the odd shot-putter who lobbed a ball - or possibly a grenade - we had a week or two of quite civil exploration and exchange. Oh and the price started to look like it was turning upwards. Even some of our fearful people seemed to become a little more hopeful.

Then wham. First the grenades arrived - usually targeted. Then the innocent questions from first timers. With luck they were genuine and the answers they got sufficient, and if they weren't then they will have been assigned the task of finding more innocent questions. At this stage I'm going with trust and just note the timing. Then a horde seemed to come out. Doubting, querulous, dismissive, pin-pricking, generalisations - statements calling people deluded, suggesting the business should be reporting outside the cycle, - and guess what the share price started to fall. Could I find an explanation in there for why - for what is actually wrong with the business other than a proposition that the end of calendar year target would be missed. If I missed any other reasoning feel free to repost below for my edification.

Among the posts was one that suggested that the company was worth whatever the market decided it was worth. Which means that it is worth less today than it was a week ago or six months ago, or a year ago. Now this is something else I can't get my head around - how can that be? If they keep improving on what is dropping out of the funnel - how can that be worth less? And how can it be that a comparatively young business (I only ever count from what I call AN or PN - post Nick) with a slew of new products and genuine sales can be worth less than a business that has no sales even if it has a great product - but yet to get FDA approval (viz RAP) or all those mining exploration companies which have yet to get anything out of the ground? Help - I can't get my head around it at all.

I don't buy the explanation that this is about some "true worth". Up and down. Bots. Strange dumps. Timing of dumps. And as much as I have invited those with negative views of the company to explain their beliefs I haven't been able to get responses other than future predictions - no more valid then than my beliefs - or statements about the share price. But I'm looking for more than that. I'd like to know what is really fundamentally wrong with the business - not just dollars but the business model, the products, the management etc.

So without explanations of why I have so horribly misjudged this business I started to wonder.

I've referred before to NC's excitable character and last year we had a clear attempt to discredit him over an extended period. This is not opinion - it is visible in a number of threads directly referring to him. We know we've changed key brokers, and we know that last year's capital raising is most likely to have led to an institution getting an earful from Nick as there was a bit of a mess in the placement of shares (again - referred to in a comment from Rezos)

So what if someone took a set against him and decided to try and make him look like a loser or a liar? How could they do it? And how long could the game last?

Alternatively what if the company really does have the potential to be one of Australia's great companies? A home grown global phenomenon. What if NC's executive of the year award was truly justified and he is the real deal? But what if - because the long term major shareholders are holding tight and/or also trying to increase their holdings - the institutions or other big players cant get the number of shares they really want to be future heros? Then how might they play the game? How long would they have to play it for? And how successful would that be as a strategy?

Maybe there are other possibilities but this will do for now. To quote the innocents - I am far to honest and trusting to know how people do these things and any insight from those who are more suspicious or maybe even from those who play the game - well I'd appreciate it. If you respond I wont presume which camp you are in!!!

Parsifal
(In case you are new to the forum - You probably don't know I'm pinto's partner but I understand from HC support that it's important for you to know that so you can decide how much weight you give to either of us collectively or individually. Notwithstanding that, comments I make are based on my own background, experience, interests and intellect )