Indeed. Or, even if there is a report, I am starting to think seriously that it does not contain good news. In such cases, management always tend to delay the inevitable disaster for as long as they can. There were many signs of that in the last few months, starting in February after the mudslide. Since that time, what news did we get?
- A news item about production starting late April (not news about actual facts but hopeful prediction)
- two news releases about Turner on TV (I still fail to see why that was worthy of a news release, except that it says they will promote themselves to a large audience, and I call that hype, not news)
- a piece about an application for a Moody listing (again, no facts on the company but just an attempt at raising its credibility with the name Moody and, by the way, what is the result of that application if anyone knows?
- a promise to release a geological report by March 31 (again, not facts but a hopeful prediction, on top of wich I was assured by sabrina that the financial report would be filled on time too)
- a last minute announcement in March to say that the geological report would be ready BEFORE April 30 and convertible debentures would help in financing the project (fact= increased dilution to wich we add another hopeful prediction.
Now, today we have no clue about aa date for production, no clue about the Moody application results, no clue about the release of the report (next week then very soon is getting vaguer and not more accurate). Moreover, the financial report due on March 31 is still not in on May 6. I do not think that El Nino blew away the accounting numbers for this one.
On top of that, boasting collaboration with local politicians or with top politicians, such as the Bolivian president, is a very bad sign. When you use the support of politicians to boost your image, it is usually a telltale sign of a scam. Every banker will tell you that.
Finally, mentioning over a hundred million ounces of indicated and inferred reserves is a good way to attract people's attention with little risk... Especially when there is an estimate of production costs at $170 an ounce. By the way, how can you estimate production costs on anything else than proven reserves????
The global picture is not pretty.
Hope I am wrong, but getting more and more pessimistic about the whole thing.
One last thing. The hype about staggering amounts of gold started before the Bre-X downfall. Without Bre-X falling a bit later, who knows if people would not have started to drive the price up in a frenzy of buying?
Michel |
