Posted by Devex6 Jan 2019 10:24
Champion gave a very fair and balanced summary of events and possibilities yesterday, and of course we can only speculate by interpreting information we currently have. I am in a different place regarding Champ’s “negative point one” though - I do think they had long planned to deal with Hope, albeit the approach might have been adapted along the way.
There are a few clues. First the half year accounts see no increase in long term debt - the $2 million will have moved into accrued liabilities. Second the email trail - they clearly knew this was coming - and seemingly not one response to Hope’s “reminder” emails. Third - I think they reached the point that even if Hope was paid he would probably veto the big deals - Baker Hughes, a full refinancing package etc. And maybe these third parties had already indicated terms that would be in conflict with Hope’s previous behaviour and use of veto.
So they will have been secretly plotting this - and the use of Moruant as their lawyers is further evidence (they certainly won’t have just rocked up to Moruant the day before the affidavit to do all this.)
So we sit and wait - and I think the bit they hadn’t fully anticipated was the Cairn response to the document release. (Although even the document release is a little bizarre - some of the emails have no real bearing on the case for the injunction. A cynic could argue that this might have been a way of also getting some wider information into the public domain using California’s open data requirements).
So now there is naturally a lot of focus on the Court papers available for inspection – but for me there are two separate but totally interlinked issues in play here, and I think many holders are focusing on just one.
First the papers lodged on October 11th that secured the initial interim injunction, and related documents. Most of us have seen them and essentially they are the SN affidavit and supporting materials.
Second FRR filed a claim on the 19th November (22nd November RNS) that sought $56 million in damages. In this claim are allegations of “unlawful interference” and “conspiracy” between OMF and Hope. We have yet to see one word of the substance of this claim – and there is a gap of 5 weeks between the 2 events. It seems pretty inconceivable that the claim can be justified without significantly more evidence - or that the two court actions can be heard in isolation.
Obviously we are going to have to wait and see how the court reads things – or how a mediated solution emerges. One thing for sure though – we have only seen a small part of the argument in the court papers seen thus far.
Imo a balanced analysis of events.My only addition would be why Cairnn resigned,Agree with Devex it was unexpected as per tweet but adds credence to my thoughts it was about them being kept in dark over a long period of time over certain bits of news rather than any secret allegiance to Hope and Outrider which if had been the case feel FRR would
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