something is going here-up 60c today at $10.70, page-5

Hi Skipper,

I have read quite a few articles referring to ongoing consolidation in the coal sector. Whitehaven Coal and Riversdale Mining are usually mentioned as the two most likely ASX listed takeoever candidates.

If I was a suitor targetting Riversdale I would use this time to acquire (when many shareholders chose to sell down part of their shareholding to realise funds to take up their share entitlement (at $9.40...$1.19 below current market price) by the 6 August deadline.

It means there has been and will continue to be an unusually high number of retail holders as sellers in the market. This should continue for the next (say) 7 trading days, ending on Tuesday 3rd August or Wednesday 4th August as funds would mostly be available T+1 or T+2 and then need to be received by Computershare by 5.00pm (AEST) on Friday 6th August.

I suspect many will use the Bpay facility (and it would be wise to make the Bpay payment by no later than Thursday 5th August to allow overnight processing by their own bank).

In other words, just as the market is seeing many sellers of Riversdale which should suppress the shareprice the shareprice is climbing strongly.

The strength of the purchasing is therefore disguised.

Are we are seeing the early stages of a takeover play for Riversdale (possibly by Vale whose neighbouring Moatize mine and infrastructre are 75% complete and may be delivering coal by as early as year end)?