Forum Archive Index - September 2003

["tennyson@caverock.net.nz" <tennyson@caverock.net.nz>]

Hi latham,

> 
> Craig Norgate et al are attempting to puchase 19.5% of WRI 
> currently @145c - (cf 132 close)
> 

If true, this won't come as any surprise to the sharechatters.    I have 
been beating the WRI drum for many months, so hopefully lots of you 
out there will have the shares by now.    Norgate is only following us.

Of course with investment nothing is certain.   So you would have been 
a brave person (albeit now a rich one) if you had sunk all of your 
money into WRI.    But it has been hard to argue that you should be 
*underweight* in WRI at any time over the past year for those who took 
a really close look at the fundamentals.

WRI has been a sitter for some kind of 'leveraged buy in' for months 
now.    Macdunk has been making the point that property is the way to 
go because you can leverage your return by using the banks money to 
buy into housing.   His logic is the right and the same logic now applies 
with WRI.   The dividend will cover the interest on your borrowings for 
buying WRI shares.  This means that if the share price goes up you 
get to pocket the price rise without putting your own capital up.  I 
wouldn't mind betting that any 'Norgate Consortium'  is using exactly 
this strategy.

I wonder how the WRI board will take such a buy in?  For some time 
now I have thought there are too many accountants and lawyers on the 
board, and no-one with a serious marketing perspective.    True, 
Norgate is also an accountant by training.   But I believe he could use 
his dairy industry savvy to give some of today's WRI board the boot up 
the bum they need.    If you think that is harsh, remember that today's 
board are substantially the same lot that presided over the disasterous 
regime of previous CEO 'I've forgotten his name already'.   Four of the 
current seven board members are coming up for their 10 year badges.  
I'd like to see some board level succession planning in the form of a 
few new faces around the board table.  The appointment of Norgate as 
a director would be a good start IMHO.

SNOOPY

discl: hold WRI





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