Member Info for Montmuzard

The other intriguing thing to say about the share price is that we've been kept in this range for months now. Basically, ever since the Alexei incident, we've been somewhere between 25p and 29p most of the time, and often almost nailed on to 27p. The range is very, very tight, despite what daily movements and UTs (falsely) suggest.

The thing that I find interesting about this is not what we as PIs usually moan about: "why can't we get over 29p?" But, rather, *why aren't we falling below 25p?*

If there wasn't much buying pressure, surely it would be easy for them to take us relentlessly down, right? Of course, there have been one or two blips, with fishing expeditions further south, but the MMs haven't dared to take us down below 25p for any length of time.

That implies at least two things to me: (1) there are no sellers down there, and (2) they know that any serious drop would stimulate buying pressure and destroy the range they've carefully constructed for IIs to keep slowly harvesting shares at a set price around 27p. That seems to be the implied bargain between the big boys. Obviously they knew all along roughly how long this process was going to take, which is why they've been so patient and happy to keep accumulating at this level rather than trying to fight to push it down further (or risk it going up).

It's probably also why, as time seems to be running out, we're now seeing infestations of ghostly green bot flies on here trying to scare off anyone thinking of dipping their toes in. Nonetheless, from a PI's perspective, we should actually be very reassured by the fact there is a strong floor to the SP and has been all along that the MMs don't dare breach in any substantive way.

I think the problem is that all the LTHs are locked in, with low averages, and no more kitchen sinks to throw at it. So, the IIs keep loading up gradually, while latecomers (who might be down 10% or whatever) get bored and cut their losses. The share has, at the same time, dropped off the herd's radar because it's been kept in this range for so long, evading the leader boards. Even when we have a good day, because the SP is high relative to its lows now, the percentage increase is never that much. Can't see it changing now until news. That's the only thing that will bring about the increase in volume required to get things moving. The problem, though, is that when the news arrives, the SP will rocket instantly and anyone on the sidelines will be locked out anyway.

@Mac - This is my feeling too. I think we're either looking at: (a) a complete buyout now in all but name (WK, MT, Rosgeo) with a sizeable (£2.00ish) special dividend followed by a free carry of 5%-10% of future revenues; or (b) a full sale of just MT (and maybe the four ready-to-go Rosgeo assets) with perhaps a lower special dividend (£1.00-£1.50) and no (or less of a) free carry, but with far greater scope to prove the remaining assets up over time and head back to Volchetundra to repeat the cycle.

Either way, the upshot is that patient shareholders can eventually look forward to upwards of four or five quid, but the ultimate size of the different dividends, the timeframe over which they arrive, and who bears which proportion of the downside risk of generating them (and enjoys the upside risk of rising PGM prices) is what is being negotiated right now.

Yeah I could live with £3.78. If I didn’t have a heart attack first.

That's without even doing any sums on MT: £5bn over the next decade, are you having a laugh? PGM prices are going through the roof: palladium is projected to be $10,000/oz by 2030. Even assuming a conservative increase to $5,000 and a conservative level of production (500k/oz) annually, that's still $2.5bn PER YEAR, with much greater upside potential. Whoever is mining MT will generate revenues of minimum $50bn over two decades, and, depending where prices go, quite plausibly two, three, four or five times' that. Five hundred million my foot. Have a word.

Why on earth would they sell MT for £500m or 20p/share when the ACF report valued it at 54-60p (on the basis of 2m oz before the flanks were approved) and they could just activate Sinosteel and be generating multiples of that amount within a couple of years? Moreover, how would 20p (or even 40p) a share "a significant dividend" and where would the incentive be for shareholders to vote that through, as opposed to voting against and pushing the board to activate Sinosteel? Crazy talk.

Not to mention - as I've put on here in some quite lengthy posts previously - that the Russian state might actually see some value in clipping NN's wings a little and diluting its dominant position in the region, if that, indeed, is how this plays out. Plus, there's also technology transfer: bringing in foreign investment also brings new expertise and methods (as well as foreign currency: all vital for a state that relies on commodities).

@Lowbands - Quite. I've invested in a few duds over the years, and guess what, I don't bother going to their messageboards anymore. In most cases I've taken them off my notification apps. Hell, half the time I completely forget which stocks they even were! The only reason anyone would ever go on a website like this to bash a stock is if they have an ulterior motive, simple as that.

"Why is everybody so tied to the AGM for the deadline. They could just as easily hold an EGM whenever they are ready. Knowing EUA will probably be longer than we hope"

You could be right. But the reason that the AGM seems the obvious place to do it is because (a) the timelines just make sense, particularly given the sequencing of the Rosgeo announcement and the previous EGM, (b) the right to raise those 250m shares expires at the next AGM, and although they could just roll it over, it then begs the question of why, if it wasn't urgent, they bothered with the EGM recently, and (c) if the AGM didn't matter, it wouldn't be effective in terms of exercising leverage over the buyers. Yet it's pretty obvious that this is exactly the function it has played for the board: they have ended the FSP and told everyone they're moving ahead with a bid, effectively saying to everyone else they've got just days to try to gazump before the circular is announced and all is revealed.

"So, there is no discernible way of accurately predicting what the acquisition value might be. And it may even be lower than the current share price."

HA ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. Loosely translated: "Now we've sown some doubt, why don't you pay for our expert advice on some other crummy companies instead, while we load up on cheap Eurasia shares ourselves".

Seriously, the Motley Fraud is a joke. Anyone listening to them so far would already have missed out on a multibagger.

My suspicion is they'll want even more time between issuing the circular and completing the voting, so the former, surely, will happen before the end of May (maybe Friday 28th to allow for digestion over the bank holiday weekend?). Either way, it wouldn't surprise me to see some news flow beginning at some point this week. The first thing to come must be the revised ACF report: that should be the signal to anyone sitting on the sidelines that the train is about to pull quite rapidly out of the station.

Ha ha, how can they keep getting the same bit wrong? Clearly meant to read 2750m shares in issue not £752bn. They must be doing it for a laugh.

Only a handful of people said up to £10. Most of the guesses (pre-Rosgeo) were in the £1 ballpark and I imagine most now would be happy with a special dividend around that level *if* it was also accompanied by either taking the Rosgeo assets to production or a free carry on the revenues from all assets if they are all sold.

@Monkey - Agreed, not least since it also reduces risk for the buyer in terms of both up-front cash required and also the potential of negative price moment in PGM markets over what is a very long timeframe of two decades. In some respects, it may also be even cash-neutral: the 5% they're paying us over the next few years could well equate to a sizeable chunk of the money they'll effectively be saving on debt financing for what would otherwise be a bigger buyout now. Everyone wins: they save on interest; we get more money but have to be patient to wait for it. In that sense, any free carry would effectively be us lending the buyer the full theoretical amount to buy the company out in return for an IOU they'll pay back to us annually for the next 20 years. The thing I like most about it is the potential upside risk: imagine if PGM prices outperform even the most optimistic assessments during the commodity supercycle!

"I guess a mass sell off by everyone to crystalize the CGT wouldn't be good anyway..."

I don't think mass selling would have any effect on the share price. Once the dividend is priced in the SP will rerate to just shy of the new company value, and institutions will hoover up any shares people want to sell knowing that they can make big money from the arbitrage. Lots of PIs will be happy take the 2% or 3% hit to release their money now and put it to use, whereas the break and butter of big money is making those guaranteed percentages on millions and millions.

"... and the BOD may have yet another plan to keep us at least partly invested".

I certainly hope so. I'm crossing my fingers for a sale of all assets, special dividend of £1.50ish now with a 5% free carry on all future revenues. We can dream.

EUA wouldn't just be a cash shell if they were still doing some exploring, managing, consulting etc.

@Mac - Me too. I think they're selling the whole shebang, so it's a full company sale in all but name. Meaning we get a sizeable special dividend now (£1+) but EUA carries on as a going concern primarily to share with us 5% or whatever of future revenues from MT, WK and the Rosgeo JV every year for the next two decades as PGM prices go stratospheric. Best of both worlds and risk-reward nicely spread for all interested parties: us, the buyer, the Russian state.

"I was just mulling over as to the reason why we didn't exit the Fsp with an offer on the table. People could easily load up now under the radar."

Which could be why the SP has been pretty stagnant since the big buying around the time EUA moved up on the indexes: i.e. the relatively low volumes and bored PIs jumping off the ship mean that IIs have been able to accumulate quietly and others who would be accumulating couldn't because of the NDAs.

@Carlito - I was exactly the same as you: bought in on a whim as SXX was falling apart, and the more research I did, the more I loaded up on the move from 0.8p to 2p. Stupidly de-risked a few in the early days and have spent two or three times my original stake to buy most of them back! If no news is forthcoming today, it would be really fun for ACF to release a new report with some big numbers on it. I think that would light the blue touchpaper. But, really, it doesn't matter what the SP is: the endgame is nigh.

@Carlito - Totally. One thing about our board - as anyone who has been here longer than five minutes would know - is that they are always understated in RNSs and never feel the need to ramp them like other Aim BODs. Let the facts do the talking. Just go back to Dmitri's interview, where he calmly talks through what's there and the approach they'll take, and it's emblematic. They have delivered constantly.

So, when they say (a) they "are committed to maximising the value for all the shareholders" the word ALL is doing a lot of work, because they mean themselves too. When they say they "are delighted to have received a proposal from a credible party" they mean all the due diligence has been done and the bid is precisely what they were demanding. When they say "a significant dividend to all shareholders" they mean an absolutely superb conclusion that benefits everyone, especially all of us who voted a few weeks ago to support them through the final stages. When they say "we are enthusiastic to advance a potential deal that provides an opportunity to monetise the value to Eurasia's shareholders" they really mean: deal done, just hang with us while we steer it through the final furlongs.