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although they get whatever amount they want in one go ---> although they could have got whatever amount they want in one go

shoelord: "polygon own 30% of WH Ireland" who is one of SM's house broker.

This is interesting.
So Polygon must have very deep knowledge and some detailed information on SM. They sold the SM CB and covered their shorts on SM, both with a big profit. They then started to increase their stake in SM through long CFD at around 5.5p per share.
They now have over 620m shares, all in CFD.
They did so gradually, day by day, although they get whatever amount they want in one go (as they had not been purchasing SM shares from the share market). Why in this way? why gradually? --- keep in the news, add pressure slowly (even when no much time left for other options to emerge)?

Their way of doing business is complicated, sophisticated, knowledge and experience intensive; what smart guys they are!

Some II sold, but Polygon accumulation continues:
Polygon: 620,000,000; 8.832%

illbetabuck: (Qatar has a title loss on their 3% of shares, however, gained a lot their 75% old CB when they reprice using AAL credit rating) "... Makes me wonder whether polygon could be acting on their behalf? "

So, Qatar now wants the AAL deal to be successful.
As Polygon bought all the over 8% shares at around the AAL offer price; and seems to wish other bidding or improvements on the AAL deal, or posting a threat to the AAL; Why could they be acting on Qatar's behalf?
Could you please explain it more explicitly?

illbetabuck: "They reported the holding after the bid was made, at the time is was stunned that they had 72% of them."

100m, 75% of (8.5% convertible bond 2023); how much in GP?
I initially thought it was 100m equivalent, and it seems not.

When this converts to £, is Qatar the largest investor of SM (230,282,070m shares + 75% old CB)?
With the AAL deal, they would have 2/3 loss on their shares but will get all their CB investment back, isn't it?

A newspaper article once mentioned that Qatar was the largest SM investor if CB was included.

However, since the reporting period started, Qatar reported only 100m shares equivalent in the old CB:
Qatar Investment Authority:
230.2m shares, 3.28%
100m shares in old CB

Sorry for typo, not The first largest shareholder; but The third largest

The third-largest shareholder Pelham sold 79m.
If there is a promising alternative option, they must have been contacted and kept updated. It is not a good sign when they started to sell their holdings.

274,232,045; %3.91
sold 79m shares at 5.4p (10/02/2020)
before
353.5m, 5.04%

Polygon added another 3m:
603,730,485
8.600%

Yes, Yellow; the following two purchases may be made by the same one (possibly Polygon; or better any one with some info), at near same time, and paid 0.02p higher than asking price:
10-Feb-20 17:11:18 5.485 31,385,533 Buy* 5.45 5.465 2m O
10-Feb-20 17:11:17 5.485 7,565,190 Buy* 5.45 5.465 414.95k O

Polygon continues to increase their stake
600,000,000; 8.547% (as reported on 7 February 2020)
before
598,416,902; 8.524%

They might have got more today, when the share price drop. It seems that the possibility of some twists may still exist, so the share price recovered from the low (around 5.38p) to above 5.45p.

https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/markets/article-7984611/Sirius-Minerals-bosses-hold-crunch-talks-shareholders-seek-backing-405m-takeover.html

"The meeting came after some individual shareholders voiced hopes that blocking the deal could lead to alternatives being considered, such as a £519m loan offer or giving Sirius investors Anglo stock.

But according to ShareSoc, Fraser and Russell dashed these hopes during the 'frank' talks. ShareSoc said: 'The board has not closed down discussions on alternative solutions and will continue to review all viable alternatives to the Anglo bid until the 11th hour. But they were at pains to stress that there is absolutely no reason for optimism.'

ShareSoc was also told the amount of cash the company is burning through – which it has tried to minimise as much as possible – leaves the directors with no choice but to recommend the Anglo bid."

The Anglo American director had been a senior manager at BHP for a long time.

BHP has $2.6bn Jansen potash (MOP) project in the Saskatchewan province of Canada, and had wanted to take over Potash Corp using $40bn (but failed). If they still want to get into the fertilizer business as a major player, then getting Sirius (Polyhalite) to become a biggest blend fertilizer (MOP+poly4) producers. If the former BHP senior manager had been interested in SM; why the current BHP manager not ? They are one of those have the power and potential business interest to do so.

https://www.fool.co.uk/investing/2016/09/28/could-sirius-minerals-plc-be-a-bid-target-for-bhp-billiton-plc/

For him and RS, the £500k may be just much less than 10% of their investments; unlike many here, the lose is almost all the investment (or saving); even worse for those deep mine workers to be working 10 years to earn their investment back (rather than getting richer as shown by the promising picture ((FTSE 100) painted by the project creator).

The only thing that we may feel better is that although this investment proves to a stupid one, many big names also bought the shares, and the mine asset is real and the mine will be taken over and completed by a big company; rather a hole being filled at the end (with a liar statue on top of it).

illbetabuck: "Jupiter do (investment fund), Polygon (hedge fund) do not [have to vote for yes]."

Polygon, held 598.4m, 8.524%, almost all bought in CFD at a price around 5.5p; i.e., they have around £33m stake in it.
Their shares take about 19.22% of II holdings (3113m), not enough to push a No vote, unless an executable alternative option appears in next week with other II's support.

However, they do put pressure on AAL, possibly into some sort of concession.

Longtermview24: "Certainly anyone holding towards end of the month should be holding for the purposes of a NO vote".

I gather most PIs and IIs who are not selling are expecting an alternative option to appear in next two weeks; or if not, most would believe under that situation, the big IIs, including, Jupiter and Polygon, will have to vote for the AAL offer.

KOH raised this retail bond idea months ago. If such bond is open to everyone, with 12% interest rate for a world class tier one assess and under the condition an alternative proposal for $680m is placed on the table just needs time to complete; this should be able to raise some emergency fund for SM to keep running beyond the end of March.

The third largest SM shareholder, Pelham (353.5m, 5.04%) is specialised in retail bonds with good returns.
As SM said, small PIs may not have very bid capacity in an open offer; however, quite a large number of them together may be able to raise around $100m (as demonstrated in past two open offers). If Pelham organises to collect $100m retail bond from existing PIs with an interest rate 12% under the condition that an alternative proposal is placed on the table; this could be done in a few days to provide SM an emergency funding for keeping running until the rest of money from the alternative package is available (through a more complicated time consuming process).

Chris Spencer-Phillips, from ShareSoc, said “Jupiter could come up with an alternative funding package which might encourage Anglo American to offer more."
He mentioned that ShareSoc could also help facilitate that.

I agree with illbetabuck that the Jupiter fund manager is not powerful enough in term of organising or providing further funding. They would push and support such a proposal.

Only Qatar, Norwegian bank, Polygon that have more financial resource could push this forward.
Not understand why the progress on this is so slow, and why key information on this has been kept from shareholders (i.e., the proportion or percentage of ownership left for shareholders ). Why the revised proposal is not acceptable? Why it cannot be improved to make it acceptable?