Member Info for Valsen

Hi Mackyd, here's my point of view :

If they manage to find a new nomad, chances are he's in on their scheme and therefore complicit in wrongdoing.

If one want to be objective and realistic, we can't see it any other way.

Because in any case, on the ground in Gabon, it's really screwed. Even settling a few arrears here and there (wages for instance) or trying to believe in Guido disguised as Santa Claus.

The new Gabon "director", Mr. Henriquet, is only Deputy CEO, therefore not CEO Gabon (He’s the 4th ''CEO'' in less than 9 months). He has not even contacted employees since his "appointment", this clarification is important.

Employees learned about it indirectly and board did not inform them either. It’s pathetic. In fact, he was just placed in this position because of his former functions at the freight forwarder Bolloré. But he'll not be able to solve other problems, as subjects are so numerous and complicated, and above all, require injecting a lot of money, which the company does not have, because it spends everything before even earning a single penny.

This appointment will not be enough at all to reassure Gabonese partners and even less to relaunch production, because the level of disorganization and the state of infrastructure no longer allow it.

Madoff would laugh if he knew about this play.

Reading the latest RNS invites us to seriously question the low-cost buyout project that does not say its name.

The fact of not finding a nomad is edifying. It is unlikely that a nomad would risk his reputation to help a team of crooked people artificially make money by cheating small shareholders.

In the end, the current strategy of our scammers seems, as has been the case for a long time, to gain more and more time to continue speculation by flooding market and practicing bump and dump. To do this, managers serve up twisted arguments to small investors (= their cash cows): adventure will continue, there’s light at the end of the tunnel, employees are mean, people want to harm them and blah blah blah.

Except that the tunnel continues to lengthen and becomes narrower and narrower, even blocked in fact. So, they will tell you stories making you believe that they will soon start a carbon credit activity. But it's total imposture, because Gabonese authorities will not grant them this possibility in any way in view of the thug behavior of this company's managers.

A portion of salaries has been paid, but new delays have been noted, almost 2 months to date. Banks are not to be blamed, it's the company that’s delaying. It’s false to say that there are categorical demands, it's a pure invention. People just want their salaries. They are not idiots and if they work, they just have to be paid. Which is not the case at all. Even Gabonese television published a report on discontent of employees who are not paid and sometimes have to wait more than three months to receive a month's arrears.

Another lie is that the country is experiencing political tensions. It’s completely false, and also very easy to verify. The country is functioning normally and situation is perfectly calm. In addition, population has widely welcomed the sidelining of the former president, whose entourage embezzled many of country's resources.

Woodbois' reputation is now deplorable, they’re blacklisted everywhere, because they have demonstrated their contempt for Gabonese employees and public authorities, which constitutes a fatal error. Indeed, Gabonese abhor this arrogant and conquering behavior on the part of foreign companies. So the blah blah blah of the RNS about transparent and close relations with local administrations is pure lies, you’ll have understood.

Earthmoving equipment and trucks are sublet, but it will destroy due to lack of mechanical maintenance, because no one feels responsible anymore. Furthermore, and in terms of local law, a forestry company does not have the right to sublet its vehicles. This scam is organized by Jean-Claude Martin, the former French manager of Mouila site, who acts remotely (he escaped nearly two months ago) using as an intermediary Alain Diounga, Gabonese manager of the company's forest management. In fact, it’s illegal, because the company does'nt have the right (by its statutes) to rent its equipment to other structures. But there’s a little money to be made by doing this.

Bankers are looking to recover leased vehicles (especially the logging trucks) after obtaining authorization from the Libreville commercial court.

Alternative RNS (Real News to Share)

Hello there

I’m in Libreville (Gabon) for at least two more months. I’m taking opportunity to give you current information, gathered from WBG salaries, as well as from administrations (I’ve many contacts there, cause I’ve been working for 13 years).

A clarification: I’m not a former employee. I’m just a friend of this company and very sorry to see the carnage caused by Guido. This guy wasted everything and should have been fired. Oddly enough, he continues to serve as a front for a big investor.

So, there’s absolutely no objective reason for things to improve and especially to return to profitability. Because volume of debts has become incredibly disproportionate to company's real assets. This debt is now out of control. Even by playing casino on AIM, the game is already lost. It can only last a little longer while trying to get rid of the few saleable products to pay board's salaries. As for shareholders and employees, they don't give a damn. They'll continue to lead you around as long as gullible investors put money on the table.

Fortunately, some shareholders have noticed that my information is still accurate. It gives concrete benchmarks to "small" investors to sort truth from the falsehood in twisted RNS published by this team of professional manipulators.

So here are my RNS of the day

Mouila site is closed, barricaded by workers (no one comes in, no one comes out). There’s no more sawmill, drying and wood processing activity. In the forest, nothing has happened for several months. So there is absolutely no production or processing of the slightest piece of wood. And since WBG has not paid its surface area taxes, it is impossible to get logs out.

There are still a few containers of wood at the port, but none are being exported (contrary to management's false claims). Freight forwarders have not been paid. CMA-GCM has blacklisted Woodbois. And with Bolloré, it's not won yet!

Here’s some additional information, which will just help to understand, but will not change anything in the ongoing disaster.

In response to a question, Bloomens is under Guido's orders. He blindly obeys everything the latter asks him to do, just like a faithful dog. We can therefore consider that he’s an accomplice of Guido.

Aminata Anselle, the Congolese bimbo that Guido had appointed DG for Gabon in February, has left to work with her predecessor. He’s a Burkinabe national, Aziz Abdoulaye Koné (financial consultant), appointed in January by the previous board of directors, but dismissed by Guido to place Aminata.

Aminata recently returned to Gabon to give information to the tax authorities, hoping to receive a commission. It’s quite surreal because she is an accomplice in some of the embezzlement committed, in particular unfair dismissals and unpaid personal bills. Tax Directorate imposed a 6 billion FCFA (about 9 million euros) adjustment on WBG, which has not paid its charges and taxes. But that will not change anything, because the company has no cash to settle this matter.

WBI has accumulated 9 billion FCFA of debts in Gabon, or about 12 million euros. It is obvious that these sums will never be repaid.

Almost all of the cash generated by the issue of a large volume of shares has most certainly gone into the pockets of main shareholders. It has not been used to straighten out the company. One almost wonders why they paid part of the late salaries to the Gabonese employees.

In Libreville, there is no one left at the company headquarters. It has become a ghost structure.

What a mess !

The two main shareholders (CHCH and a second one located in Dubai), have discreetly withdrawn by practicing massive bump and dump to limit their losses. As a result, they have become a minority (so, we no longer know who has the legitimacy to run the company, because the majority is rather made up to date of the sum of the "small" shareholders). In addition, the two aforementioned shareholders are in conflict and are tearing each other apart.

Today, it seems that Guido is making himself very small, because he is only an employee in this crazy story. And he is not ready to come and provide explanations to his employees by taking the risk of returning to Gabon (He could spend unpleasant moments there in police custody...).

Company's vehicles and equipment will be shortly seized at request of banking group BGFI Bank and its leasing subsidiary Finatra, which obtained court's approval to send bailiffs for this purpose.

In light of these concrete criteria, it is not clear what realistic outcome other than bankruptcy could occur. It would be truly surprising if there were any alternative other than liquidation or a very low-cost buyout by an opportunistic operator already positioned in Africa.

What a waste, for employees and shareholders, but crooks very often get away with it without being prosecuted. That's just the way it is.

The information I’ve been sharing with you since May has proven to be accurate and reality has caught up with the team of crooks represented by Mr. Guido-I-know-everything-better-than-everyone. But what will happen now?

Let's first go back to some enlightening developments:

The results for first half of 2024 were tinkered with to make people believe that everything is fine. In particular productivity (except that there’s no point in producing without selling). On the other hand, what WBI could not admit (at risk of scaring away investors) is that the financial report for 2023 highlighted serious accounting errors, attributable to opaque financial management on part of the board at the time (C. Gueddes, P. Dolan, etc.), with operations allowing siphoning of money belonging to the company.

Guido Theuns, who thinks he’s very strong and very smart, and above all, who hates being contradicted, stubbornly ignored local advice and particularities. He managed the feat of completely disorganizing a system that was working quite well before he was parachuted in. His greed and absolute lack of ethics led him to unscrupulously pocket what was due to a subcontractor, namely approximately more than a million euros coldly embezzled under the nose of the Gabonese client, the Ministry of Public Works (which finally withdrew the contract).

Guido's blabbering about a restructuring into specialty poles (logging, peeling, sawmill, etc.) was pure smoke and mirrors, because this organization already existed before his arrival.

Guido's disrespectful and arrogant behavior towards WBI executives and salespeople, whether in London, Copenhagen and Mauritius, not to mention Libreville, led the most competent of them to resign rather than suffer managerial whims of this amateur who is as intellectually dishonest as he is incompetent in the field of forestry industry. One wrong word, one opinion differed from his and you were fired immediately. I can send you the list of names of his victims, it is worth a look.

As for the "carbon plan", it would have been necessary to respect criteria and keep commitments on ground in Gabon to benefit from it. Which was not at all the case. But it made shareholders dream... In any case, this plan no longer has any real existence and local administration no longer has the slightest confidence in an over-indebted company with a lamentable reputation.

i’ll try to answer you using only factual and verified elements. so there will be some parameters missing, but my answer will remain as close to reality as possible.

guido is just a straw man, he’s not an investor in the strict sense of the word. he represents interests, but to this day i dont know who’s behind him precisely. in any case, this is a mainly speculative approach, which has ended up moving away from its "real" economic base, namely the forestry industry and its exploitation site in mouila.

which is a serious mistake, because by letting this tool deteriorate, the money is no longer coming in enough (not at all at this stage) and debt is increasing again and again. which amounts to shooting themselves in the foot for the leaders.

i think that investors wanted a "field" man when they put guido in charge last december. bad calculation, because he's completely unsuited to africa, he has been able to do so on many occasions. then, he is quite primitive in his choices and decisions. as soon as someone does not share his opinion, he brutalizes or fires them without ceremony. he has done so on several occasions.

moreover, he has an inexplicable hatred for the former management team that preceded him. he fired everyone and improvised by leaving incompetent people on site to run the system. for example, the malian night watchman at mouila site became sawmill manager. and the dryer boiler exploded shortly after, because no one had put water in it. it's a detail, but there are many examples like that.

he lost a major road repair contract, from which he embezzled a significant portion of the budget that was due to his subcontractor (1.5 million euros, including more than 1 million stolen from the subcontractor).

he doesn't come to the operating sites, he clearly doesn't care. he even once sponsored a golf tournament in libreville, while his employees weren't paid.

for the hundreds of employees, it's bull****. he recruited a hundred additional employees shortly after he arrived, in particular to make gabonese public authorities believe that the company was growing. except that he doesn't pay these people, so it's pure theater.

in short, guido is a super liar and a great manipulator. i don't really know who’s behind him, but it would be interesting to dig into this aspect.

furthermore, i imagine that departure of adriaan (whom i don't know at all) is either because he didn't agree with guido and was fired, or because he preferred to jump ship, like several other salespeople in london, copenhagen and mauritius did before him.

For Monday's shares, dunno.

But it's certain that small shareholders have been fooled for months and months with fake RNS.

And now, its a great uncertainty for stock market.

I don't know personally what will happen exactly. Not much good I guess.

But for real company, we can reasonably consider that's over.

Even Jesus Christ would have a hard time getting it back on track.

In the real life of Woodbois, especially in Gabon, nothing is going well, quite the opposite.

Even if you manage to buy wood on the company's website, assuming it is available, it will not be shipped. Because they have not paid the freight forwarders, so they are blacklisted at the port of Libreville.

They have not paid the charges, taxes, duties, salaries (still 2 months late), service providers, suppliers, their rent, leasing of trucks. They have no money to buy diesel to run the machines. The electricity was supposed to be cut off yesterday at the processing site in Mouila. Logging has completely stopped. The workers are on an unlimited strike, because they are tired of being taken for fools.

There is no longer any real manager in the area, apart from a few Gabonese executives who are completely overwhelmed and helpless. Guido Theuns is completely unreachable, he passes messages to employees via the former operations manager, a Frenchman who preferred discreetly leave Gabon 3 weeks ago now. The total amount of debts is just colossal and the critical threshold allowing to regain control of the activity by injecting money has been largely exceeded. The situation is therefore simply uncontrollable and the company is potentially bankrupt.

This is the situation today.

The tunnel has lengthened considerably with Mr. Theuns' mode of organization, and the light that was still flickering ten months ago at the end of this tunnel has slowly gone out. The candle is completely consumed.

It’s really a shame, because Woodbois had great potential. It has turned into a gigantic waste. On the backs of small investors.

Hi, AmyStake,

And right now, what d'ya think about recommendations of Roger 65 and other observers who seriously analyze criteria and events?

Poor of them, they don't understand anything about stock market, unlike you...

Good luck for the future

Ooops, I made a little confusion, sorry.

It was not SYDBANK I wanted to talk about, but NYCREDIT, to whom WBI owes 2.5 million Euros.

For its part, SYDBANK had withdrawn a £6 million line of credit from WBI in April 2023. Which led WBI to raise an equivalent sum by issuing 1.20 billion shares.

In any case, banking institutions are clearly wary of WBI. That’s also the case in Gabon, with BGFI BANK and its leasing subsidiary FINATRA.

This probably explain why the board has not found anything better than a family office in Dubai to obtain some facilities.

It seems we’re near the denouement, the moment when lie’s caught up with reality.

It’s very interesting to note that more and more shareholders are becoming aware of this reality, after having lost time and money believing things could start up again during the last few months. Don’t worry about the main investors, they have not really lost money, even if mechanism has reached its limits.

It’s not Africa that’s to be blamed. Other operators earn a decent living there. I’m one of them and I know very well what I’m talking about. To win there, you just have to make effort to adapt to this environment (and not the other way around) and above all, consider Africans as partners and not as fools who will be exploited by dangling stupid and untenable promises in front of them.

Guido Theuns is just an employee, very well paid every month. He is an excellent communicator, with a warm personality. This is the case when he presents his campsite in France alongside his wife. He’s almost credible when he tells his stories by twisting reality and not hesitating to lie to continue to present the company in a positive way. He is helped by the fact that very few shareholders make effort to understand on which specific activities and which counterparts in assets fundraising is based. He even manages to pass himself off as a victim of bad practices on the part of his suppliers, customers, administrations, employees, predecessors, service providers, etc.

In fact, he has all the characteristics of a tie merchant, or even a real crook. He practices financial cavalry, because he has already spent what the company has not yet earned. The company has hardly made any money for many months because he has succeeded in the feat of completely disorganizing it. He tries to compensate by publishing false RNS’s, which increases the SP each time by combining it with bump & dump.

And then it falls back quickly. So, he starts again. But today, even with a huge fundraising, the company will no longer be able to restart and make money with its operating site in Gabon, because the sum of debts and material, human and financial damage is higher than total assets. I am not even sure that he dares to return himself to Gabon. Even his French operational manager, who nevertheless has experience in Africa, practically fled after privately admitting that company owes nearly 14 million euros in debts there (not to mention Sydbank's debt in Denmark).

One can wonder who really runs this company, but it’s very possible that main investors from a year ago have kindly evaporated from the capital. WBI has become a simple house of cards that will fly away at the slightest breath of air. So, good luck to those who think they can still make money on such bases. For my part, I would be curious to secretly attend the next board of directors…

Hi Motogte

Your analysis of stock market fluctuations is perfectly logical and valid, moreover your experience in this matter is obvious.

WBI's handicap is the coupling of its accumulation of debts with a business that has stopped. And this stoppage feeds the accumulation of debts by worsening the situation.

Tool production is in such a state that restarting activity will now cost a lot of money over a period that can be estimated at one year, before hoping to return to a normal level of production, for example that of 2023.

Which means that the company has increased his deficit by simply stifling its own industrial tool, due to inconsistent management. Once a certain level has been passed, it becomes unlikely that situation will return to normal if one don’t radically change one element in equation. And the main thing to change is management style.

The problem is that this level has been clearly exceeded, so guarantee of success in mid or long term is very low as the damage is significant, even by injecting large amounts into treasury. Which the company clearly seems incapable of doing.

Hi Barnetpeter

If you think that half of these developments could stop the business, you’re quite right.

There’s no more activity, just because employees are on unlimited strike and the site is almost no longer operational. But you know, until 2023, there was never a strike at WBG, because salaries were always paid. Always. And nothing to do with oil industry, one cant compare those two activities.

You know, I am not making up anything that’s mentioned. Everything is perfectly accurate and can be verified by yourself if you are a little curious and objective.

RNS’s contain a lot of data (sometimes not very convincing) but they dont reflect reality in any way. And when they mention activity, it’s always in the future: we’re going to restructure, we’re going to do this, we’re going to do that, and blah blah blah, never in present. Just incantations.

Just open your eyes, reality of the facts is rather easy to obtain and understand. And sorry if this disappoints.

So, if we look at the consequences on each of these 5 assets of the CEO's inappropriate management after 9 months, we see:

1/ No change. Except that surface area taxes are not paid. Money problem.

2/ Processing site is in very poor condition, due to a lack of budget to maintain equipment and buy diesel to run machines. The transport vehicles are no longer in good condition except for 6, many machines are out of service. Money problem.

3/ G. Theuns fired almost all the efficient executives of the previous team, in Mouila and at the headquarters in Libreville. He replaced them with amateurs without great skills. As for employees, they are paid from time to time, but never completely. Money problems, which Management does not have. It even tried to make believe at one point that it was the fault of the bank holidays, in a letter addressed to the employees. This kind of swindle only works once.

4/ The contacts and good relations established within the administration in the past are now non-existent. Distrust is the rule, because WBG does not pay its taxes, duties and social contributions. Once again, money problem. The debt is colossal compared to company’s size.

5/ Actors of local economic are now wary of WBG which inspires rejection, for non-payment of its debts. Again and again money problem.

In summary: with an inadequate vision of management style to adopt and a habit of always wanting to force things through without taking into account local realities, believing that making salaams to flatter some ministers will allow him to hide dubious practices, by never paying his debts and not responding to complaints from one and all for many months, by trying to create a diversion through biased communication on RNS’s to reassure investors who nevertheless suspect that something is wrong, CEO has been unable to obtain any other results than absolute disorder coupled with a major financial rout.

With such a cumulative amount of debt and such incredible disorder in the company, you will have to smoke hallucinogenic mushrooms to convince yourself of the ability of management team to straighten out this company that it is leading straight towards bankruptcy.

These are not just comments, because they are based on specific facts and events, they are irrefutable.

Of course, this information is worrying, because it frustrates small investors who are kept in the dark about situation to make money off their backs and who no longer understand anything about the stock market movements.

So, I can be taken for a complainer, but I simply provide shareholders with ground information. Moreover, no one, absolutely no one can demonstrate that I am not telling the truth. If you consider me a liar, that would mean that WBG employees are liars, that Gabonese press is lying, that Gabonese administrations are lying, that suppliers, service providers and banking institutions are also liars.

The observation is simple: WBG was, I say "was" (because it is in the past now) a large company, with difficulties, but also serious assets to develop and conquer. So I'll give you 5 assets that could allow it to prosper in January 2024:

1/ WBG has very large areas of forestry exploitation

2/ WBG has a complete processing site not far from exploitation sites

3/ WBG has a sufficient number of qualified workers to ensure that work’s properly done

4/ WBG has an extensive network of contacts in the administrations

5/ WBG is well integrated into Gabonese economic environment.

The problem, not to say the nightmare, is that new management did not rely on the company's strengths to correct what was wrong and preserve what was working. Running a forestry company is not about communicating, that is not enough. You have to roll up your sleeves and go walk in the mud of the forest, be present on the processing site and take a very close interest in maintaining the equipment and vehicle fleet in good condition.

Addition

The result was rapid: loss of a major market for repair of traffic lanes, loss of revenue from exploitation and wood processing, loss of credibility with authorities and local administrations who expect compliance with social and tax commitments (which will never happen), loss of customers, severe deterioration of equipment and vehicules (no longer maintained). In short: completely reduced revenue and debts everywhere, even in Denmark where the group still has to repay a €5M credit facility to SYBANK establishment...

So, even if you still believe in the tissue of idiocies that are offered to you in the RNS's, with the aim of hiding the sad reality from you, don't expect to make money with this company. Because one may soon learn that its leaders have vanished into thin air after a few recent major stock market operations, intended to save what they can of their interests.

And if you think that the "carbon plan" will work like a parachute, ask Santa Claus what he thinks about it, but it's not looking good. Because WBI has not respected any of the commitments planned so that this financial windfall will come back to it one day.

PS: the videos are real. They clearly illustrate the anger and dismay of employees completely ignored by an irresponsible management, whose representatives are totally unreachable and do not take the risk of coming to try to calm them down.

Pps: I don't know Sammy, but I note that some people make very relevant remarks and analyses on the chat. And their doubts are largely well-founded, the trajectory of the ratings is a fair reflection of this.

Hello there,

I know that some will curse me. I am in Gabon. I read your comments. I’ll give you the reality of a situation presented in a twisted way for more than 8 months now by a management that makes fun of you.

Coz if you’re really objective and a little curious, you’ll find absolutely no concrete and serious information in the RNS's which are summed up in vague promises and dubious assertions. These are only untruths, pure manipulation, combined with bump and bump. Reread these RNS's and consult at the same time Gabonese press which regularly mentions negative consequences of the management team's embezzlement. It splashes everywhere. To the point that there are no longer any European executives on the ground. The last one, Jean-Claude Martin (operational manager) preferred discreetly leave the territory a little over 2 weeks ago. Before fleeing, he admitted that the company has about 9 billion FCFA in accumulated debts in Gabon (about 13.7 million Euros).

Lest call a spade a spade : this company has not had any activity for months. The available wood is not necessarily marketable and everything is blocked due to unpaid bills. The sawmill is no longer working. Neither is the processing plant. Forestry activity has been non-existent for 5 months. The few TC that could be delivered to customers are blocked at the port cause Bolloré and CMA-CGM have not been paid. The log transport trucks have been sublet to Cora Wood (Italian company) to deliver wood to its Chinese customers. Only 6 trucks out of 14 remain in working order. The leasing organization (Finatra) has launched a seizure procedure to recover them, because monthly payments have not been paid for a long time. The surface area taxes, taxes, social security contributions, suppliers and service providers have not been paid. The WBG office even had to move recently, because they weren't even paying the rent in Libreville. The Director barely came for an hour a day and preferred to keep a low profile by staying at the hotel.

Strikes have become regular, because management pays its employees sparingly (when it gives them something). This has nothing to do with the local situation, which is completely normal and stable. The political events of 2023 have had no negative consequences on the local economy. There is no instability or any particular or new problems for companies here. These are just twisted arguments

The situation is easy to understand: current management wanted to impose itself through unsuitable and rather brutal methods with the reason of profoundly changing the organization and the way it operates. The real objective was to fire previous management team. They were replaced by amateurs as part of a total improvisation. Management (Guido Theuns and his B-series bimbo) has never been interested in what happens on exploitation and production sites. In any case, they don't understand anything about forestry business and don't care, it's just obvious!

Hi Motogte

Your words are relevant and respectable.

I have no particular interest in encouraging you to sell, just to provide real information.

Here’s today's:

https://topinfosgabon.com/articles/deux-mois-sans-salaires-les-agents-de-wood-bois-a-nouveau-en-greve

Now, I’ll let you play quietly and sincerely wish you to win.

And I promise not to say anything else.