Hi pj,I understand your sentiment that it could have been worse,...

Hi pj,

I understand your sentiment that it could have been worse, but consider the following:
1)
the last time that Wyllie filed notice was back in 2000;
2)
Wyllie did not file Notice at the time of the placement being done in May 2003 (most other substantial shareholders would have done this, and do do this);
3)
the Sunday Mail article followed the re-issuing of the September 4 announcement in, of all things, "plain English";
4)
this was done on September 10;
5)
the re-issued announcement followed on from requests received from shareholders (which shareholders???) and from the ASX (where's the ASX request which is normally formal, not informal - and why??? - it doesn't happen in other circumstances);
6)
diligent Directors would have felt the need for the Company to be placed in a temporary trading halt before the commencement of trading on the 15th (ie: to ensure that there was a fully informed market);
7)
the Directors did not do this (ie: they were happy for uninformed trading to continue for 2:02 hours before the trading suspension occurred);
8)
Monday's trading halt appears to have been triggered by the ASX querying the price volatility, to which EBR then requested a trading halt pending formalisation of a response (ie: the ASX initiated an enquiry, prompting the Company to request a trading halt, to which the ASX then agreed);
9)
unless the ASX had initiated these steps it is doubtful that EBR would have initiated a trading halt;
10)
within the space of the 2:02 trading window, Wyllie was able to dispose of 1.5M shares;
11)
relative to the day's trading that was significant (ie: >5% of the traded stock);
12)
Wyllie and EBR share a common director;
13)
that Director was sufficiently aware (one would assume) of the media article and its influence on Monday's pricing volatility and yet did not seem moved (or inspired) to adhere to proper principles of Corporate Governance;
14)
controls broke down as a result, and a completely uninformed market developed, but not before at least one common (or connected) party had been able to take advantage of the situation;
15)
still holding 14M shares becomes irrelevant in those circumstances where the trust of the shareholders, and the integrity of the Board and /or of some of its conduct can be questioned; and
16)
this is yet another example of bad Corporate Governance, and opaque /haphazard regard for the principles of continuous disclosure (something which is very much being practised by a large number of companies at the moment, both big and small).

So, just how much worse could it have been?

Simply put, Monday's trading action could still end up attracting closer ASX /ASIC scrutiny in due course because certainly something transpired that has not yet been sufficiently explained. At least that much should be clear from today's ASX Notice.