BG,Fair comments, I certainly feel for holders that have ridden...

BG,
Fair comments, I certainly feel for holders that have ridden this story all the way down. As investors, this kind of experience is an awful feeling. I hope they are still holding and hopefully will be rewarded. But I’m not so sure that those shareholders should be blaming the management totally for the poor fortunes of CCC.

There were hundreds of coal mines under development in the last 4-5 years, the majority have gone bust or have suffered the same/worse than CCC, the sudden downturn in the coal price cycle + increasing costs all conspired and contributed to the shakeout. Those who raised development capital early are still around, others are gone. I take my hat off to the CCC management, despite the Industry downturn and they managed to do more for less, they hung-on and developed 3 operating mines on what I call petty cash budgets. (As you know it costs $1 bil + to develop a coal mine in the Bowen Basin or the Hunter Valley.Compare this to CCC achievements, I don't know how they did this.

This brings me to the Balance Sheet Debt issue. Agree it is a heavy load at this juncture, (relative to current Cash flow strength) however the notional value of CCC assets (4 operating mines) has to be into the $billions once the coal price cycle turns up again (I believe it must turn soon because while the global volume production run rate is at record levels, the increased supply is just only meeting demand)

Cheers
Huckle