"it looked like a m of funeral plots" bahahaha. Pretty funny!
Re: the tax treatment.
this is from one of my older posts Took me a while to find it (amusingly these properties were also in the McMullen County):
ANTARES ENERGY 29/11/2010 $200,000,000USD Sale of Yellow Rose & BlueBonnet
Pg 3: TAXATION
Antares intends to qualify for the use of Section 1031 of the Internal Revenue Code. This section allows for the redeployment of capital from the completion of an asset sale of one project into another project within 180 days without the realised gain being recognised at the time of the exchange.
So one alternative is that they'll roll all the funds into new leases over the next 6 months.
Second alternative is that they'll roll a portion into new leases (and use the tax deferral on that %) pay tax on the rest and distribute that as a capital return as referred to in John's recent presentation.
that said however - the appointment of RBS to "oversee" the sale still has me a little puzzled. If it was a straight land transaction they were after - I can't see what use RBS would be. My suspicion is that they are keeping their options open by exploring a third option = a corporate deal ie instead of $xxxm dollars for the EFS acerages - they're seeking $y/share for the company. With something like a new co to hold the wandoo agreement and any new leases.
that would then transfer the tax issues back to the shareholders.
Personally - with Aussie tax rules allowing a 50% CGT exemption for shares held for more than 12 months - this last option rings my bells.
I must admit I'm fascinated to see how these cards are going to be played out.I guess we'll find out across the next couple of months?!
TXN Price at posting:
62.0¢ Sentiment: Buy Disclosure: Held