I think that is one way to look at it. There certainly doesn't...

I think that is one way to look at it. There certainly doesn't seem to be a mad rush to collect the dividend.

On the other hand, though, there are still buyers. Everything under 40 cents was snapped up (well, maybe not snapped but at lease cautiously purchased) so somebody thinks it is worth a punt. Right now the return is about 20% for the march dividend (not annualised and6.75 cents full franked and a SP of 40 cents). That would be good money if there wasn't a catch!

My gut feeling is the decline in SP in the last few days is more a sentiment of the overall doom and gloom around rather than any real change in prospects for TIM or TIMPB. So much so that at at less than 40 cents I thought I'd have another punt on a good outcome.

The catch (es) would be 1) that they are not going to pay the dividend at all in which case look to see both TIMPB and TIM drop a lot - so much so that even with a triggered conversion you wouldn't get much of the investment back 2) they pay this dividend but then that's it (they go under) - you would be trading your 40 cents for 6.75 cents. That's not a good deal or 3) anything in between.

While I liked the presentation last week (maybe just my optimism and general disposition to this type of business), do we take them at their word that sale negotiations are going that well? Even if so, is that enough to keep things going? In any case, last year they announced the dividend on 6 march. Let's hope they do so again this year.