Member Info for DonkeyOatey

"Whether NVS purchased the shares himself or not is irrelevant ."

What utter garbage, Andrew - of course it matters whether NVS purchased his shares (basically, no, by the way, he did not purchase most of them with his own money.) If he purchased them at a particular price, then it is fair to assume that he saw value at that price and will not want to see the company ultimately sell for less than that. When they are freebies, as most of his are, then it's all just about having a risk-free gamble with most of his focus on milking as much as he can from the company directly through salary and expenses, and OH BOY is he milking Arc for a small fortune whilst delivering nothing but value destruction to the shareholders.

Guzzler: very accurate posting! It is almost comical the way the clown presents himself as this great negotiator for getting the Anglo deal done - hardly any great achievement to sell Anglo on doing what they were absolutely desperate to do: get their Zambia licences back! And, of course, even less of an achievement for Arc shareholders since he and his cronies will be siphoning off most of the Anglo cash into their own pockets with their ludicrous salaries.

His one real dealmaker test was the disposal of the gold licences, and for that he showed himself to be an absolute failure and cret1n, since he took as consideration millions of pounds worth of shares in an African fraud which has now been taken off the US exchange! Even the most basic of due diligence would've shown what a fraud Tingo was, but of course Nick the great highly experienced executive couldn't even see what was right under his nose.

I suspect that in a few months, once he and his team have put most of the Anglo cash into their own pockets, there will be yet another raise to keep the lights on and to reward him and his team for delivering such outstanding value for shareholders. (Any Arc shareholders actually feeling enriched by the whole experience? No? I thought not!)

"When will NVS put out all of the positive updates that he promised us."

Caddy, you're not seriously trying to tell us that - after all these years of NVS and his lies and missed timescales and failed DD - you actually placed any serious faith when he said that? Why on earth would you ever trust someone who has told so many untruths here, time after time? Just research NVS's past at his other employers and you will see how toxic he is to any company he touches.

"Does this man have any idea of what is going on at all?"

The truth is, I suspect, that he couldn't care less what happens to the share price just so long as his ridiculously high salary continues to be paid on time (along with the other, what, 9? directorships he has - but of course he's devoting his full attention to each of them!) NVS has been a plague on every company he's been associated with since he left Anglo years ago, and you only have to do some research into his history to understand why nobody wants to go anywhere near a company in which he is involved. I thought it was very telling the way he spoke so negatively about shareholders on the most recent presentation.

"If you want to hold them to account they have to break the rules"

You're talking utter rubbish, battyk - there's plenty of incompetence in Arc's management for which they should be held accountable, doesn't mean they broken any "rules" per se, just not up to the job. After all, who in a microcap stock accepts $5m in shares in a fraud in return for a valuable asset, and then (because they've effectively given away the asset with nothing of value to show for it) they then have to do a large dilutive raise at multi-year lows in order to keep paying themselves their salaries! By anyone's standards that is absolute incompetence, but I suppose it doesn't break any "rules".

The real tragedy, Mr Upham, is that I don't even have sufficient faith in the British electorate (Great, or otherwise) to remove these complete cr5t1ns as the government in 5 years time, I greatly fear Britain is in for at least 10 years of LIEbour governments, but I'd be utterly thrilled to be proven wrong.

DT2004: That is a remarkably insightful posting for the ARCM board - indeed, most of that money will find its way into the pockets of NVS and his merry men, since they vastly overpay themselves and continually fail to deliver. Does anyone actually think it was some kind of success for him to get Anglo to do a deal to buy back into the licences they'd been kicking themselves for leaving for a few years now? It's hardly a Salesman of the Year type accomplishment to sell something to a buyer who was desperate to buy! I'm sure there will be the usual howles of how fantastic NVS is, despite the fact that he's almost bankrupted the company to do the Anglo deal, completely mishandled the DD on the Tingo shares which saw Arc take shares in an US listed fraud in return for gold assets (obviously gold's a completely worthless asset these days, I do understand) then did a massive placing at multiyear lows to ensure that he could continue paying himself and his co-directors their high six figure salaries. Add into the mix his complete failure to ever deliver on the timelines he promises, and it's clear that the Botswana project is simply a MakeWork project to justify his continued salary, since with Anglo running the Zambia drills (as the rampers constantly crow) we don't really need a team of "experienced executives" costing about a million quid a year.

Seisnav you don't seem to understand that there are two questions here for potential investors:

1. Is there Cu in great quantities in the ground which Anglo will find (I personally would say it is more than likely a yes than a no, so that's good)

2. Is the current BoD capable of delivering that value to Arc shareholders?

Before you answer question 2, perhaps reflect on

i. the outstanding job they did of selling the Gold licences for shares in Tingo, a company which is now suspended because of fraud allegations (which any half-decent DD completed by Arc would've revealed.)

ii. the high salaries they continue to pay themselves even when cash was extremely low

iii. all of the deferred costs which now need to be paid out of Arc's relatively small cash payment from the JV payment schedule (since investment banks, lawyers, advisors and accountants do NOT work for free!)

Arc hasn't revealed any great drill results from the KCB, and the JV hasn't released a single drill result yet. None of it points to a bright future for Arc shareholders.

BUT you can console yourselves safe in the knowledge that Anglo's interests will be very well protected by their army of lawyers and managers - anyone who really wants exposure to what is probably in the Zambia licence areas should buy Anglo shares; for now, Arc shares are still vastly overpriced in my view unless there is something released from the truth machine to support the share price; failing which it's probably worth about 0.5p pr share, if that, given the overpaid and underachieving (to date)  management.

I would have a lot more faith in East Star delivering, primarily because the CEO Alex Walker owns about 10% of the company, whereas what NVS and his cronies have bought in Arc with their own money numbers in just a fraction of 1% of the company while they continue taking absurdly high salaries for delivering so very little of substance to any ARC holders. Tragic, such great licences, and by far the worst management I've ever experienced myself, even on AIM.

Fantastic, it's SewerRat Richard98 back - the guy who spent months calling anyone who disagreed with him (about how fantastic EUA's bod are) a sewer rat! Strange to see that he has now turned into a sewer rat himself, perhaps gone short, Richy??

TNR:

I keep forgetting who the really smart person was who kept telling us all that Anglo had been drilling all the way through the rainy season, after all, as I recall the individual saying, with our name we're built for it! Perhaps that particularly clever and well-informed individual could clarify for us exactly how many metres were drilled during the rainy season on Arc's Zambia licences?

ADVFN? Could you perhaps enlighten me as to my username over there?

Sad to see such a decent collection of licences so badly mismanaged by what must surely be the worst management team on aim, if not the entire London market.

I keep forgetting who the really smart person was who kept telling us all that Anglo had been drilling all the way through the rainy season, after all, as I recall the individual saying, with our name we're built for it! Perhaps that high IQ individual could clarify for us exactly how many metres were drilled during the rainy season on Arc's Zambia licences?

Yes, it's hard to believe that the brokers couldn't fill a few hundred thousand at a price more than 10% below today's price! It's almost as if some people on here with their fantasies about buying loads of shares are just fantasists/liars. No, no, that couldn't be the case.

And how well do you think contract prices are negotiated with this subcontracting geology firm when the CEO of the contracting party is also the owner of the subcontractor?

I think you will find that there are companies on aim (not many, I grant you) where the CEO is paid 40-50k with options and delivers vastly better than Marc Sale at FCM - you only have to look at POW where Paul Johnson was on about 50k and worked every hour under the sun, or GMET where Oliver Frieson gets about the same, and he has actually delivered solid shareholder returns at GMET - if you'd invested 10k in GMET when they listed you'd have about 26k now; if you'd invested that same 10k in FCM you'd have about 1800 quid! Hmmm, profit of 160% or loss of >80% of your investment, I know which CEO I think is more capable.

PS that is in no way to say that I am doubting his geological skills, I understand he is extremely capable as a geologist. It's his dismal performance, imo, as CEO which I find intolerable.

Bobbust - have you actually read the accounts of this company, in which I presume you are invested?

He takes about 50k a year as CEO, and about a quarter million for his geological services. Read the accounts.

The last time I posted on the investor forum on their website, I got a private email from them offering to discuss things privately - I suggested things should be done publicly on their investor forum and that I'd be happy to read his reply - needless to say, deafening silence from them on the issue.

As for your comments about there being no fundraise coming, well that may or may not be true. But it is a quite obvious schoolboy error to be talking about how impossible it is to finance juniors when you are known to be CEO of a microcap which is constantly desperate for cash.

My only hope for FCM is that POW finally get things fixed with Power Arabia and their Athabasca basin projects, and turn their attention to FCM where they hold about one quarter of the shares, and kick out Mark Sale and put in someone capable of actually doing the job (and who doesn't milk the company for a second income to provide "geological services".)

Scott240 I don't agree that he trashed the company, but what he wrote was utterly stupid, to be honest. As you rightly point out he has bought almost nothing in shares in FCM, and actually has the nerve to take two incomes from FCM - a full-time CEO salary plus six figures to provide geological services. What an utter disgrace the man is, and that pathetic excuse he tweeted about having posting on his personal account not the company account. How utterly incapable is he, exactly? He's the CEO of a microcap explorer which is always short of cash, so much so that it had to spend months negotiating a deal to sell two assets for a couple of hundred grand, and a 10% one year loan for a similar amount. Then he writes about how terrible the markets are for raising funds. If he really didn't expect those following FCM to join those dots then he is completely useless. Why he is permitted to continue at FCM I do not understand. The largest shareholder is POW, and the CEO at POW is like night and day compared to MS - Sean Wade is professional, capable, delivering deals, and Marc Sale is... well, pretty much the opposite. But at least he has achieved one success at FCM - yet a new low point for the shares. He should be put on performance related pay - he'd end up cutting a check to the FCM board rather than the other way round. Total joke.

Well done, Mr Sale, another of your grand designs, no doubt, to get our shares down to these new cheap levels. Undoubtedly it will be championed as a great way to get new long term investors into the company.

Isn't Richard98 the same person who has literally hundreds of historic posts on EUA calling anyone who disagrees with him a "sewer rat"? What disgusting behaviour...

As slow as things seem to be here, I would consider it a great success if they actually get the drill turning by Christmas, and if we get results by Easter 2025!