IOC and XOM have now moved this game to the next move. The clock is now ticking waiting for OSH/TOT to make their move. I guess they have 2 more days to come back. If they don't then IOC is free to move forward with XOM. However, it is my understanding that OSH/TOT or just TOT or anyone else, could make an offer any day prior to shareholders voting on the XOM offer.
So I invite the board members to paint this picture more clearly. So beginning on July 21 I believe IOC is free to begin preparing all the deliverables that need to be prepared to finalize the offering so that IOC shareholders can vote on the XOM offer. How far away would that be? Two months is my "shoot from the hip" guess. Finalize the legalese, prepare documents, mail documents, allow 2 week gap for the vote. Seems ~2 months from July 21 we will be voting again on the XOM proposal if there is no counter from OSH/TOT. Any better guess from the finanical guys? So that is Sept 21st ish?
Won't A7 be spudded by Sept 21? If they have a bidding war in progress and the final shareholder vote has not occurred yet, what is likely to happen? What do TOT, OSH and IOC want to happen? I think they all want this nailed down before the well is drilled to TD. IF they drill the well and the logs look wonderful or horrible or somewhere in between, they will have to share that info IMHO, as it is very material to this offer. I suspect they, including XOM, would rather not complicate this deal by potentially motivating shareholders to hold out for an even better deal by positive well results. If you drill enough appraisal wells, sooner or later you get a big disappointment. But right now, it seems that A7 can only add volume, not take any away, so we shareholders, under that condition should want the results before voting on a final dea. I don't think they will allow that.
If OSH/TOT sweeten their deal and XOM walks away, then it seems the turnaround time to vote is maybe one month. I would guess all they need to do is mail an amendment to the offer to shareholders which shold go very fast, allow for the ~2 week lead, and then have the meeting. So if the deal if sealed by end of this week, then maybe we could be voting by August 22, maybe?
I think all the companies want to get this done sooner rather than later. Now that we have the XOM offer delcared superior, it seems this "I see you, and I raise you $XX billion" activity should go much, much faster. There is nothing new to learn. It's time to put up, if they want to stay in the game. So one or more counter offers could go fast, I think.
So I would think this will go fast, and then we'll have the 1-2 month delay before we vote. I would venture that the companies would say yes or no as to whether they are going to counter, in quick succession and not keep everyone guessing. E.g., I can't imagine a situation where one company seems to have won, and then the last week before we vote, one of the exisitng players changes their mind and decides to raise their offer. I don't think they operate that way once the bidding war has started.
This is just some wonderings as to how this may unfold and how long it might take. It seems safe to say that it will all be decided and voted on by end of September, if not sooner. Other opinions?
I think the chance of a new party introducing an offer is close to zero, but that would be really cool if somebody did. The more they merrier.
It seems the only bad thing for shareholders is if the could delay A7 and/or A7 has major problems which drag this thing way out so that we don't get the rest of our payment until Q1 2017. Let's hope that doesn't happen. But with this "Hotel California" stock, we may be in for another completely unexpected "surprise" as has happened many times before. "It ain't over til it's over."