Banter and General Comments, page-4705

I have not sold any of my GXY shares and have topped up (a little) during the last 6 months. I believe the company is a sound investment based on fundamentals.My present sentiment is to hold but I will not be buying more in the foreseeable future.My patience is wearing thin.

It pays to be realistic,even sceptical, in evaluating your investment on an ongoing basis.

Fundamentals are one thing,but the real determinant of SP is market sentiment. Any tradeable commodity is worth what the market will pay--no more, no less. The sentiment towards this company is not positive. It is at best guarded and that will continue until there is good news. Not just the occasional announcement,but sustained at regular intervals.Selling the furniture that is surplus to requirements to give the bank account a one off hit is not a sustainable business plan.

ON SHORTERS: I accept that there have been attempts to manipulate the share price, probably mostly by shorters. One only has to look at course of sales figures, correlated to the level of short positions to form that view.But I do not accept that shorting is the only, or even principal, reason for the languishing SP. I see shorters much like weeds.They colonise vacant fields.Vacant iin this analogy means vacant of positive sentiment. Of course, once the weeds get a hold, getting growth of quality feed grass gets harder, weed growth continues and increases and so on.Until sentiment shifts this will be the pattern here.The board and management do in my view have a responsibility to try to redress the situation. Have they done enough? In my opinion , no.

ON SENTIMENT:The market is notoriously: 1.Risk averse 2,Spooked by uncertainty.When the likelihood of a good deal is talked up, and then followed by a long period of silence, how could that not give rise to uncertainty and concern.

WHERE ARE NEGOTIATIONS AT NOW? The thrust of comments from GXY devotees on this site is that the company is right to (quietly) play the potential partners off against each other to get the best deal. We were told there was a long list of offers which the company was whittling down with the guidance of J P Morgan to extract the best deal. Suitors will only hang around hoping to get the lady's hand (or such other parts as she may decide to bestow) for so long.Are offers still there? Were there ever actually offers on the table? In general terms--commercial confidence must be respected--what is the company's philosophy as to what it is looking to achieve going forward which will frame the negotiations? Why would that need to be kept secret?It could hardly be the case after all this time that the company has not documented and made known within the negotiations what its medium to long term business plan is and, it follows, what sort of arrangement or agreement would have to underpin the discussions.What is the plan for SDV for example?.If the company is looking to get inspiration from the offerors, that would be of concern. One would hope and expect that the company has clear objectives and any "offers" are to be tested against those objectives.

Right now, I am far from clear as to what are the company's short term, medium term and long term targets, and how it hopes to achieve them