start believing in vampires.
Contrary to popular belief, vampires don't really die from stakes driven into their chests. According to vampire legend, they are undead and they stay that way for centuries, just waiting for the right moment to strike again.
With Qantas, they just call Airline Partners Australia.
admitted its bid was dead. Buried.
RIP. For the moment maybe it is, really, undead.
Either way, it has looked a saga of greed, even stupidity and arrogance.
between the ears of a consortium that included Macquarie Bank, the Texas Pacific private equity firm and Australia's Allco.
Here is a group that is the serious end of town. There's no shortage of takeover experience here and plenty of smarts.
takeover bid so stupendously wrong?
Yes, the Qantas takeover bid is dead. Well, for now.
APA reckons it could always dig up the bid again, cleanse the body, inject it with formalin, apply lots of make-up and dress it up as brand new.
"As indicated yesterday, given the demonstrated majority shareholder support for APA's proposal, APA is exploring a number of alternatives, including the possibility of making a renewed offer for Qantas," APA said in its statement.
As a take on the term "majority", this is pure spin.
APA, of course, is referring to the number of shareholders, not the proportion of their support on the register.
If you have 10 shareholders, what do you do if one of them owns 90 per cent? Whatever support you have from the other nine is about as useful as a concrete balloon.
Calling them a "majority" is misleading and arguably treating the market with contempt.
But is that possible?
Ian Ramsay, director of the University of Melbourne's centre for corporate law and securities regulation, said there might be some problems with another bid.
another bid came in," Professor Ramsay said. "A big question is can their duties when the previous bid has failed. Could a board in good faith, looking after the interests of its shareholders, put more heat on directors.
When the Qantas board endorsed the first offer, it was put under and judgement.
increase the second time around. So Qantas directors think they have been having a hard time?
They ain't seen nothing yet.
from $11.1 billion.
But even that's problematic.
get the funding lined up. The imponderable is how much time APA needs to give the market time to settle.
months.
of foreign ownership. Transport Minister Mark Vaile said this week Qantas Sales Act.
shareholders.
During the first bid, APA continually stressed that it was their first and final offer, and as a result people traded on that basis. profit.
Certainly, APA's announcement that the bid was dead and buried the matter. In hindsight, the big strategic error came early in the bid when APA said it was their "final" offer, and therefore could not be increased.
As soon as they did that, they dealt themselves out of more money.
management on side, the rest would come. In the end, it was not enough.
Still, APA now seems to be locked in a relationship with Qantas management.
Exactly how that will play out remains to be seen. The outcome If they have, it's been an expensive lesson.
He's a bona fide Hollywood star, and Steven Spielberg and Brad Pitt are among his fans, but what Eric Bana treasures most is his life as a suburban dad.
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