"There are no winners in the BrisConnections saga", that's how the Financial Review described the failed attempt to wind up Brisconnect at yesterday's EGM. The man who called the EGM, Nicholas Bolton, had previously been seen as a white night standing up for mum and dad shareholders. Then yesterday it became apparent that he had sold the voting rights to his 77.4 million units (about a fifth of the company) to Leighton Holdings subsidiary Thiess-John Holland for $4.5 million.
Opinions of Mr Bolton have since deteriorated. Shareholder View will admit to mistakenly considering him a white knight, in hindsight a misplaced view. Though Mr Bolton was merely acting in self interest (as everyone in this whole mess has been, it should be noted), this should not suddenly make him an instant villain.
He did not sell his units, just the voting rights. He retains his liability, along with other unit holders. One Twitter post summed it up perfectly: "Is Nicholas Bolton the biggest knob-jockey in Australian Corporate history? Cuts a deal for $4.5m & now owes $127m!". And importantly, even if Mr Bolton had voted his stake to wind up Brisconnect, it would have only raised the for vote from 36% to 63%, still shy of the 75% needed to wind it up. In the end, the outcome would still be the same, but he was $4.5 million richer.
Given those options, who wouldn't have done the same?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment