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Chesh as you asked
Here are some HYPOTHETICAL sums relating to a significant equity based stake from a major investor (but following my brain fade yesterday you should all get the calculator out and check!!).
At today's Sp the market cap is ~£250 mill and a potential major investor could choose to buy shares in the market up to 30% before having to make a formal bid for the company - in theory that would cost them £75 mill but of course their heavy buying pressure would drive the price up and at current volumes they couldn't do it surreptitiously .
Far more likely(though still improbable IMV) is a direct arrangement with SXX to acquire shares in a placing.
As SXX needs $500(£380) mill to carry on, lets assume that's a figure the acquirer would contemplate(remember its 1.5 X the current MC).
So in the VERY BEST case, SXX could issue enough shares at the current market price to raise $500 mill , about 11 bill shares at 3.5p. The company gets its first tranche funding ,the market cap becomes £630 mill. In theory the SP stays at 3.5p 'cos there is a market cap of £630 mill and 18 bill shares in issue 630mill/18bill = 3.5. In practise the SP will rise because the fear of insolvency dissipates and prospects improve , by how much is anyone 's guess.
However in the real world the acquirer will want their new equity at less (probably much less) than the current price.Lets say SXX are forced to issue 40 bill new shares at 1p (allowing for the costs of the issue), then the market cap again becomes £630 mill but the shares in issue are now 47 bill and the starting price for the shares post the exercise is 1.3p, that is the price from which appreciation due to improved sentiment begins.
Caveats all of the above is a theoretical, arithmetic exercise to indicate a range of possibilities for an unlikely solution and as yesterday shows I am fallible , maybe extremely so!!

Read the RNS and listened in on the conf. call.I have this on my watch list (and have had for a while).Today's fall is a reasonable reaction to the admission that growth targets will not be met and may not be met at best 'till the latter part of next year. Main problems are emerging markets where the majority of ULVR's business is done, eg India and west Africa. IMV(note not mentioned by ULVR)India is a concern for a number of reasons, internal unrest is growing, the economy is slowing and the banking system is corrupt and unsound, therefore a hope of return to growth there is IMV improbable.I am holding off for a while until either the FY figs due early next year look better, or the SP falls below 4000 at which point I think it will be a buy.

WWguk you are absolutely correct . while I stand by the analysis in the first part of my 13.52 post , the rest pertaining to SXX is the exact reverse of the truth.My only defence is that I recognised my error and corrected it promptly and publicly.
Mea culpa!

I have just reread my last post and I think it is rubbish !

As a bit of a numbers nerd I spent some of the weekend working out the implications of the election on my portfolio.(generally enormously positive as i had positioned it heavily in domestic stocks)
I then moved on to the likely future path of the markets, sterling and interest rates , with the following conclusions:
Higher sterling which I expect now to persist for at least six to twelve months will hold down inflation, will incline the BOE to consider rate interest rate reductions, so current very low interest rates will persist for months at least(I suspect years)Inward investment to the UK will rise sharply and significantly.
Higher sterling , which again I think is likely to be true for years not months will be good for importers and bad for exporters.
OK you are probably wondering why I am posting here, here's why .
SXX sought to borrow $500 mill in senior secured notes in August /September when the FX rate was $1.20-1.22 to the pound , it is now $1.33, that is 9% higher and IMV may well head towards $1.40 Ie SXX borrowing costs have fallen by at least 9%. As the second tranche of borrowing of ~$3 bill is also likely to be $ denominated SXX build costs (much of which will be in sterling) have fallen by something approaching 10% over the life of the project. While US based lenders will know that lending when sterling is high and being repayed as sterling falls is not good business. I think the situation has changed for the better as far as SXX is concerned. That doesn't mean I think funding is a done deal , but a slim chance just got quite a lot better.

GLA (but like your current bete-noir I won't invest 'till I see the money!)

I sold out here just over a year ago on the basis of sentiment around the sector generally, even though I regard NRR as one of the best run propcos.I have been buying back lately and added more today for the following reasons.
The recent half year results and presentation were positive with a clear plan to support the divi, by divestment and refreshing the portfolio,the decline in pub numbers appears to have ended,the election gives a degree of much needed clarity,there is an expectation of a market-wide "pop" especially for UK based businesses and the weekend papers carried a story that NRR having monetised the pubs car parks for Co-op stores, the space above for flats are now looking at using redundant kitchen space for "dark kitchens" to support the food delivery business. It's that sort of thorough and imaginative business strategy which impresses me here and , as I say iIam rebuilding a position.

CA have recently bought about 4m HUR shares taking advantage of the recent fall in price,and as is typical of Bernstein, backing his judgement.
Having said that, he holds stakes in Allied minds- down 40% in the last six months , Northgate - down 14% in one month and he has doubled his stake in De la rue - down 60 %in six months so maybe his judgement isn't quite as good as he thinks!!!

Terminology - A naked short is these days, borrowing shares from a holder, for a fee and selling into the market in the expectation of being able to buy back cheaper. The point being that there is no balancing position . The risks of a sudden share price rise are therefore "uncovered" I e naked.

Re shorts It isn't always possible to know which shorts are "naked" ie an uncovered short position and which are balanced by either convertible bond holdings or swaps or long holdings , but generally it is true that few large short positions are naked , however Highbridge and Och -Ziff have a reputation for naked shorts and I am pretty sure that the Polygon position is balanced.As a general rule the hedgies who change their short position most often are rebalancing to adjust for SP movements.

I monitor SXX (and all the other companies I'm interested in) on the companies house website and have just received notice of the termination of contracts for messrs Carter(chief development officer) and Clarke(NED).Appointed to the board is Nicholas Anthony KIng, company secretary. Seven member Board beginning to look a bit thin.

The number of shares in issue at a future date is MUCH less significant than the discount factor used for NPV calcs. As an exercise try a very simple NPV calc and then vary the discount factor by 1%, the change to the outcome is dramatic. My fag packet calc on the notepad on my desk for a very simple sum gets a difference of 12% to the NPV per 1% change to discount factor, add in the discount risk and I ( or you) can produce almost any number you want from the same starting point, by varying the WACC. This quote sums the situation up well
"Calculating what discount rate to use in your discounted cash flow calculation is no easy choice. It's as much art as it is science."

Hi folks, I'm just recently back from a couple of weeks in Barcelona, where I attended a conference on "The Financial market infrastructure" and yes much of it was as boring as it sounds , but as ever there is always something to learn and for me one of the most important things to emerge came from the sessions on crypto currencies.
Now I firmly believe that all of these Bitcoin, Libra et al are essentially a scam , not unlike Ponzi schemes where only the first in and fastest out make a profit, BUT it was alarming to see the level of absolute unwavering faith held by the devotees , even when ALL the evidence is against them, and to be brutally honest it reminded me of many of the posters here in your unremitting belief that somehow it will all turn out for the best . I suggest you go to the BBC website and search for "Dr Ruja Ignatova" and read and /or watch the materIal , taking particular note of how people just couldn't bring themselves to admit that it was all going to turn out badly, despite the evidence being crystal clear.
It is almost three months since the 17 Sep RNS "pulling " the ST2 fundraise and setting out the intention of scaling back and/or suspending much of the work programme.
The six months period which the company hoped to give themselves to identify and alternative funding solution is half over and the next month includes the extended break that most of the finance world takes over Xmas and the new year. I fear that sxx's room for manoeuvre is almost exhausted, and that any "strategic partner" will end up owning most or all of the equity , or , at best, have a vice-like grip on any future revenue stream.
On a lighter note I learned another valuable lesson about data analysis. As I was entering a gents toilet I saw a guy stand at the device with a series of emoji-like icons , a smiley face if you thought the facilities were clean and tidy graded through to a frown if not.The guy stood for a minute or two pressing the smiley emoji a number of times , then went into the loo ,collected his cleaning trolley and left!!
I learned never to trust data unless you were sure that it is independently gathered!! A useful lesson for all when reading company produced material.

All looks quite good , worth ignoring the habitual market drop on results.
On the basis that the Xmas half is likely to be better than the first half, the disposals will reduce debt ,the integration of Europac is proceeding well(SMDS appear to be one of the shrewdest buyers and integrators.)I still expect my estimates of 3 sep to be almost fully met and have added some today on the early drop.A well run company in a growth area , should be loved by the anti-capitalists as a green champion , everything points to a sound long term future.

I don't know much about the technicalities of oil drilling and I'm not a day trader type. BUT after years of market investment , sufficiently effective to have kept me and my family for the last twenty, I have become familiar with a number of stock market patterns. One is what I have labelled the Bungee effect, simply put it is that on bad news many shares fall dramatically and then recover somewhat, fall again but less far, recover further , you get the picture.The technical term for this is damped harmonic motion, but either way a pattern of less vigorous ups and downs with a gentle upward gradient is what it looks like.
I suspect we're in for some of that here.
My fundamental analysis is that a drilling program funded by Spirit has been less successful than hoped(is it just a suspicious mind that suggests HUR did a deal on acreage they were less confident about and kept the good stuff for themselves?).The upside is that there is evidence of widespread light oil, the downside is that exact location and extraction may be trickier than we hoped.I hold here on the basis of Lancaster as a medium term producer , earning sufficient to justify a price for HUR higher than now, with a drilling program which may produce evidence of larger reserves and hence a sharp uplift in value.

I can exclusively reveal the cause of the delay in publishing an RNS . My impeccable source was in Rymans in Guildford yesterday and overheard an order from a young office junior who had he said , cycled up urgently from Godalming, for two packs of HB pencils , an A4 noteblock and a calculator with a 12 DIGIT screen, he was most insistent as to the latter and said his office was engaged in some high level mathematics dealing with large numbers.
He was last seen pedalling furiously away.
Now you may regard this as proof positive of your wildest hopes, I on the other hand will reserve judgement on such unsubstantiated tittle-tattle.

erratum second last line "causing" not casing.

At the presentation last November(?)at the miners institute in Newcastle one of SXX geology team was very specific that the tunnel was seen as low risk because of the consistency of the redcar mudstone through which it will pass for most of its length, indeed its route has been carefully chosen to minimise risk. The shafts on the other hand must pass through a number of different geological layers and the interfaces between them as well as water bearing strata . The consequence of the shaft environment is that contractually, SXX bear a share of any problems encountered casing delay or cost overrun, should they differ from the geological profile which they (SXX) have provided .

Hi strab, your post is based on sound logic but misses a couple of significant points. First , there really isn't much value left in SXX to short, the company is currently worth about £250 mill and shorts represent about 6-7% of that so roughly £15 mill. In practical terms there aren't that many more free SXX shares floating around to short so it just isn't practical to build a bigger position without completely distorting the market .
If SXX was to go bust then the six major holders of shorts with about 1% each would make a couple of million pounds . Now that sounds like a lot of money to a PI, but it's a fraction of the assets of the shorters(I know from personal contacts that one of them manages £40 billion + of assets). The second point to make is that there are much more lucrative positions to be held in the run up to the election, eg a short position in BT, NG, the water utilities all of whom would fall by 20% plus in the (unlikely )event of a Labour win , or even the prospect of a Labour minority propped up by the SNP . Also the banks and insurance companies, which hold hundreds of billions of FTSE 100 assets and are a proxy for the FTSE index, would be hammered by anything other than a working conservative majority and a small(ish) short there could provide a large return.
The truth of the matter is that, despite the activity and interest on this board SXX are now a minnow and barely noticed by most of the business community.

This is the article in question , for subscribers , I don't cut and paste 'cos it is an infringement of copyright, but it is a somewhat ill-thought out attack on the energy sources that(currently) supply much of the the worlds needs.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/pensions-retirement/news/workplace-pension-probably-invested-fossil-fuels/

Looks like I might start my "election based " investment plan a little early, have cash waiting for buying in the utilities space and if, as many of you suspect , BT's SP is hit by the Labour party announcement then it is a good time to buy.
Likelihood of a Labour election win is vanishingly small,BT is still a major cash generator, has bought the football rights without being driven to pay excessively, has held its divi(though I factor in a cut sometime in the future)and its earnings still offer decent divi cover. Having sold here last autumn at ~250p I will re-invest progressively below 200p to stash as part of my high yield portfolio.