Qantas and MacBank debacle - a sign of the times

The schemozzle which has been the Airline Partners Australia attempted takeover of Qantas is very instructive. APA's bid was apparently worth Aus $11.1 billion.
The SMH reports:

"Macquarie Bank's crack team, .... assumed complete control of bringing in the 50 per cent of Qantas shares needed to keep alive Airline Partners Australia's $11.1 billion bid for the airline."

That bid to for a buy-out failed spectacularly, over the weekend. The report goes on:

"The failure will also have a heavy impact on the Qantas board, particularly the chairwoman, Margaret Jackson, whose position is now untenable. Many believe she has no option but to resign immediately. It was she who pushed the bid through and then, in an almost hysterical outburst in March, exhorted investors to accept it.

Since then it has been revealed the consortium planned to strip $4.5 billion from the company's coffers in the first year."

Then they report that:
"However, US investors indicated to the Herald over the weekend that they would like to see Qantas's chief executive, Geoff Dixon, and his management team stay on, afraid their departure would create a vacuum."

Finally, it states:

"The first to voice opposition, Andrew Sisson, of Balanced Equity Management, galvanised other investors, who had quietly opposed the bid. But even he has urged that Mr Dixon and his team remain. "There is no reason why the executives can't continue to be leading the company if the takeover doesn't proceed," he said in March.

"Mr Dixon said yesterday he would continue in his job "at the behest of the board". He stood to earn as much as $60 million in performance fees had the deal gone ahead."

*****

What has become of Australia?
We are being played for fools and idiots. This started under Hawke and Keating, and has been followed by the Howard and Costello team. Those Governments first led the charge to asset-strip the country by selling off our precious commonly held assets - Telstra, Commonwealth Bank, Qantas, and many more.

Should we be surprised if the unprincipled "smart boys" from the top end of town follow suit, and asset strip these assets once again?

Macquarie Bank's directors and executives ought hang their heads in shame. They would, if they had any principles, but they don't, so they won't!

*****

It is entirely likely that the MacBank people will be working the phones from this morning, preparing a new bid to buy out Qantas. One wonders:- how much they are being encouraged by the Chairman and the Chief Executive?

Financial tip tips me over the edge.

I start to wonder about my fellow man, when someone I have met once, and have written emails to on a few occasions, gets me so wrong, that he could send me the following email.
Names of persons and companies have been altered to protect the guilty parties.

Hi Denis
I am presently in Perth Wa looking at another Uranium company over here its
called Xxxxxxx1.
If u buy Xxxxxxx1 shares by friday next week u are entitled to a 1 for 3
share issue in Xxxxxxx1's next company at no cost to u in a Uranium company
called Xxxxxxx2 in the Northern Territory.
This deal is a bargain and in years to come will be worth heaps.
I bought about 45k shares in a company called Xxxxxxxx3 in January 2006 and
presently they are worth about 3.25 a share in january 2006 i got them for
the price of 33 cents a share.!!!!!!!!!!!!
Sorry i did not make the saturday night meeting, a big rain storm held me up
and ew other things happened as well.
How did the night go and more importantly did (Person A) front up to the event.
I will catch up with u when i get back from Perth on late sunday.
Gxxxx
p.s big write up in (NewspaperX) today about Xxxxxxx3, Xxxxxxx1 and
Xxxxxx4 it all looks good so far.

Frankly I was so gob-smacked by this seemingly well-meaning "tip", that it tipped me over the edge. I replied as follows:

Subject: Dear Prime Polluter.

Hi Xxxxx

Glad your investments are going well. Thanks for the tip.

Unfortunately, I am as poor as a church-mouse, and such proposals are totally beyond my ability to take advantage of.

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As for whether I would ethically consider investing in a uranium mine, I will leave you to ponder, but you might find a clue in my re-wording of the Subject line in the email.

I know that coal and other petro-chemical industries are probably going to cause a catastrophic collapse of the earth's climate as we know it.

It's simple. All that CO2 will cause the temperature of the worlds oceans to rise to the point that the Oceans will start giving off CO2, (currently they act like a sink to absorb most of the CO2 we produce - far more than the world's forests absorb).

Once that happens, you will get a catastrophic melting of the polar caps, which will destroy the circulatory flow of ocean currents, which will cause the Gulf Stream to stop flowing. Europe and Nth America will be plunged into a mini Ice Age.

That will cause such Geo-political instability that world wars are inevitable.

The Ice Age might even be a really big one (like the last one, with 3km of ice over the top of Europe as we know it now. I am talking about something sufficiently huge and powerful to carve out the Great Lakes of North America. Serious stuff.

These events appear to occur quite suddenly (in geological terms, maybe over 100 or so years). So, start knitting your booties and gloves now.

*****

Long after that catastrophe, any human life forms which might still exist (say in 40, 000 years time) as the earth starts to recover from the next Ice Age, those humans will still be dealing with the poisonous residue of the Nuclear Cycle which your Mining Company friends will have bestowed upon the earth.

Sorry - but that's how it will pan out. Just because you and I may not be around to actually see it all happen, does not mean that this is not a genuine ethical issue.

You can see that I am the wrong person to send this offer to - for several reasons. In a weird way, I am almost flattered that you did send it to me. "Thanks, but no, thanks".

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Person A, who did turn up at the Launch, and the farewell party, is far more "Green" than I am. So, I doubt you would have much in common.

Cheers

Denis

Love to Grow: Grow to Love