Hi Stayer,I have been thinking about this for a while, maybe...

Hi Stayer,

I have been thinking about this for a while, maybe thinking about it too much, anyhow as you says erorrs a plenty.

Reworking the figures on Fridays close but assuming Soul take over Brickworks I come up with the following figures.

Values on the shareholdings (figures in the millions) of TPM $298, Rural Holdings $44, Clover $14, Australian Pharmecutical $34 and New Hope of $2,884 together with the investment portfolio of $507 for $3,781. There is also Souls Private Equity of $90. This totals to $3,871 less say $800 million of tax on the New Hope sale. This gives assets of $3,071 plus Brickworks which is worth $600 per its balance sheet (once you take out the SOL shares Brickworks own) for total assets of $3,700 rounded. I am offesting the SOL cash with the SOL liabilities as they are about equal.

If Brickworks is worth $600 and the SOL shares Brickwork owns are $1,400 odd as of Friday, then a takeover or deal to buy Brickworks should value it at say $14 ($2,000 divided by 146 million Brickworks shares). Assuming SOL paid $1,400 for the 100 million Brickworks shares it doesn't own then I am getting the following ballpark figure.

$3,700 less $1,400 is $2,300 against 137 million shares (ie the Brickworks shares in SOL are cancelled) or $17 or so.

The $17 was a bit less than I expected but I supose a lot of the "hidden" value would disapear once there was anything like a takeover. Brickworks has in the recent past been trading at about the value of its shares in SOL with the rest being worth nothing, but the chance of buying it for that would be zilch.

The Financil Review late this week said Perpetual, who have been taking pot shots at SOL, were saying a billion dollars of hidden value could unlocked (by undoing the cross shareholdings) for what thats worth - there were no details about the billion dollar figure cited.

Anyhow I think I will have a beer after coming up with that.

Cheers