Fancypants - really difficult to know who is watching us and...

Fancypants - really difficult to know who is watching us and what is being discussed or whether an offer will be forthcoming in the short term.

IMO this is a 50/50 call - the large players need to secure their future market share and can only do so by buying into existing reserves with those being ripe for development being the most likely targets. When the geographical location does not present any political hurdles and there is a shortage of gas to feed the existing local market - this reduces capex to bring gas to market and brings the likes of COI into the frame of those out hunting.

Three possible scenarios as I see things:

1. Early take out of our 40% of Mahalo. Much of the risk has been eliminated as that well is flowing like a geezer so who wouldn't want to snaffle our 40%? Downside - with 40% the new owner will still be in the minority which is why Santos with 30% already must be in the frame - not exclusively but somewhere near the top of the heap.

2. Early total company take out. Problematic to come up with a fair valuation for Galilee at the moment as still in it's infancy - but a Major could bag Mahalo as a 'dead cert' and Galilee as their lower cost risk. Downside - Majors are risk averse and like to have the Juniors doing all the hard work and taking failures 'on the chin' before they get involved. Galilee although already proving it's potential with that 240k gas flow for 24 hours from just 13 metres maybe a risk too great for the big boys to consider at this stage. They would rather pay more for certainty rather than less for risk.

3. We go all the way to production with our 40% of Mahalo and eventually with Galilee with whatever percentage we end up with having farmed out much of the risk ourselves. This is favourite for those of us shareholders who are after long term yield as opposed to making a quick upfront return. Downside - nearly all of the news so far has topped expectations and it will only be a matter of time before inevitably there will be some delay or hiccup - that's life and only to be expected. Additional capital will be required which has proven easy in the past - but more of a long term play.

Personally I'm reckoning our share of Mahalo will be bought out and a heads of agreement reached that once certain milestones have been hit at Galilee that we have the option to sell out at that point for an agreed value calc.

As to the recent buying activity - whoever bought in wanted to do so now rather than wait around before the next tranch of capital raising - that tells me that they are either impatient or know that if they waited until then they would have missed the boat. This would indicate news earlier rather than later.

Who knows? Time will tell....