I take your point, Bruce.
Nevertheless I make this response. Generally no businessman or woman takes an all or nothing position without a full review of the facts, and even then probably not 100%. Mr. Neimuth's not a businessman. Of course I do not want to back anyone into a corner. Still, a board member has certain responsibilities. To fulfill them, I believe, they have adequate access to speak to BD, to speak to Sam Shaw, to speak to the IPM management. If they prefer to leave it all up to two people at AZBOM, I don't feel they are exercising the sort of informed oversight that comes with the territory. That is how i feel. You know how to reach me. If any of them has an interest in hearing from just this one fellow, fine. I will make the effort. Let me know.
Look at this situation from Behre Dolbear's perspective. With the controversy surrounding this project, they could have walked away long ago. But that is not what you do if you take pride in your reputation. You do not just handle the easy ones. You do your job as
thoroughly as possible. They "signed off" on the chloride leach assays of .04+ and Niemuth just said in the national press there isn't anything worth measuring in that dirt. Unless he was misquoted, and he wasn't. That is what he said. period. If you're BD, why risk your reputation on this difficult project? I think the damn reason is obvious and it isn't that they're for sale or that they need the fees!
Look at it from IPM's perspective. They hired BD. You just don't do that if you are the sort of company Niemuth has accused you of in the national press. Who is backed into a corner! They have stood up under enormous pressure. They have worked for us far more than most managements I have known, and that is more than a few.
Look at if from Dr. Sam Shaw's perspective. Why risk the hard won reputation of, what, 40+ years in the mining business by joining IPM management? The reasons are: Lee Furlong is legit, real, extremely impressive, and he has probably cracked a riddle that has far reaching implications for the mining world, and the shorts. And Dr. Shaw has seen the proof, or at least the beginning proof, that the conventional wisdom was wrong. (I'll bet he was as surprised as NN will soon be too!) Now he is on hand and on board to see this project finally prove out. Maybe i shouldn't be speaking for him, so this is my impression, how's that..
I cannot in one brief letter convey the critical mass of information gathered over years not months and hundreds of interviews that provides me with 99% certainty that IPM has and will deliver the goods. I can try, i hope effectively, to convey an image of a bureau that "refuses to look thru Galileo's telescope," and hopefully also a picture of a loose cannon that could stand a bit of restraint at the very least.
People who are risking their money in this project have worked very hard also. Virtually all of them are aware long since of AZBOM and the TSE delisting. Seeing them and their faith so cursorily dismissed has gotten under my skin. We deserve a fair hearing and I believe we will get it from BD. I am hopeful that the Board of Directors of AZBOM will make an independent effort to provide the same. It is clear that AZBOM, as long as it is steered by current management, can not and will not.
Lastly, I looked in my recent post at a simple thread of 3 or 4 AZBOM statements. I believe they are virtually verbatim quotes. I believe they reach, with no equivication, the conclusion noted. It is IPM and BD and the (long-side) share owners in a corner. I merely question if the members of the board really want to have this sort of thing said on their behalf without making any effort to see if there is another side of the story.
I can't predict tomorrow's market. I will say that thus far the stock market holds the views of AZBOM, if not in contempt, certainly not in the same high regard accorded a few years back. The judgement of the market based on price so far, IMO, is that the work done both by the TSE and the Bureau was superficial, was in fact preordained to be
negative by virtue of pre-existing attitudes (about fire assay, about the area, etc) before the first "verifying" sample was dug. And that the work done by IPM and reported by IPM is, if not a certainty, far more likely to be a true and accurate reflection of the value of BRX than before.
Friday, I faxed the reasoned plea. I really did! I know many others have as well, to the Board and to the Gov. If they do not see that serious effort has gone into our side of the argument from the strong support IPM shareholders provide, well... what's a person to do?
Anyhow, Bruce, you are probably right, but at this point if my post gets to the board even without the "positive side of the story" that's fine by me.
your pal, "alte" |
