Jayne & All:
Personally, I am going to refrain from commenting on ASTG's Chapter 11 filing or anything else about the company until more information is available. However, I did forward your post to ASTG and received the following from Dal Grauer.
You, and everyone else, can evaluate it's merits or demerits.
Wes
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Wes,
To answer Jayne's points as they appear:
This filing is not ASTG's "finale," rather it is a move to make it a healthier corporation.
The directors have not drained money from the company. I know that at this point you only have our word for this, but this kind of thing will come out in the court, I would think, and certainly will in the 10K. All the money-draining was done before we left Joe Lanza's office and terminated our relationship with him.
JL did not have a prospect with the money to "step in and turn this company around." Whenever we asked for a proposal, there was never one forthcoming. Andy Proctor finally did get a proposal out of one outfit and he agreed with us that it wasn't viable, mainly because there was no willingness to put up money, which is what this company needed to solve its problems.
Tha accusation that JV and/or any any of us were writing checks for personal expenses is an old one and long since proven false. Again, I think the question of who was draining what will be investigated by the court.
JL knows that this filing will put his bogus claims 'way back on the back burner. We now will not have to spend the lawyer's fees to prosecute our suit against JL—the court will make the settlement decision and Joe knows that it is unlikely to find his claims legitimate. Naturally he is pissed about this. (By the way, this filing puts an automatic stay on all lawsuits, as I'm sure you know.)
As for Profit Magazine being in business and "growing every day," I would love to see some paperwork on this. All the time I was in that office, Joe was subsidising Profit to the extent that it was a major drain on his resources.
I know you've spoken to JV so I assume he's gone into a little detail as to why we've made this move. Bottom line is, it was done to protect ASTG and its shareholders.
As we learn things, like time-frames, etc., we'll publish them. We are also preparing an in-depth statement about the Chapter 11—what led up to it, what's likely to happen, etc.
Sorry I haven't answered your e-mail sooner. As you can imagine, we've been really busy, both inside and outside the office.
Thanks,
Dal |
