Agree @jcmleng and @lankypom, this seems more focused on getting clicks by than doing any real investigation or analysis that would interest an investor or analyst.

Also appears to be part of a broader trend to knock down the tall poppies that they helped in part to build up.

Even more so at MIN, although there's a lot more manure for them to mine over there.

The plans seems to be keep putting these sort of stories in the paper, daily if possible, until the clicks reduce to a level where it's no longer titillating enough readers.

I'm just as guilty of clicking in this as I read stories in the Fin about any companies I hold.

I actually feel like I have benefited from this where I feel like I understand the business well enough to buy when the market it saying sell.

Still, it seems to be part of the 'enshitification' of the media in general which shows no sign of slowing down...

All the better for Strawman members who can share and build enough common knowledge to help find the signal amongst all the noise.

Disc: Held.

I’ll not dignify the salacious nature of the AFR article with any comment and restrict my remarks to the substance here.

First, Maree is a cofounder and her remaining Performance rights are an immaterial holding given what she has just sold. So, for all intents and purposes, this is a founder exit.

The disclosure lacks detail. The shares are now held by RW. RW now has an obligation to pay for those share in quarterly payments over up to 7 years. While the release indicates to me that payments will be determined by the SP over each quarter for the volume of shares relating to each payment, it is unclear to me whether there is a minimum payment in each quarter (in terms of number of shares being paid for) because the use of “up to” only implies to me that RW can accelerate the payment schedule.

Real Wise holds 37.43% of $WTC, and Maree’s 8.17% is 3.06% worth $1.3bn at Friday’s close. So her up front payment of $285m is about 22% of the value (assuming the other assets in Real Wise are relatively immaterial).

So, it seems that Maree and Richard had some arrangement whereby if Maree ever wanted to sell out, Richard would get first refusal, with the option to do a structured arrangement, so he doesn’t need to stump up all the cash at once. Such an arrangement might even have been written into the shareholders agreement or constitution of Real Wise - pre-emption clauses are not an uncommon thing.

Ultimately, even though Maree no longer has the voting power of these shares, she still has a progressively declining but for now significant economic interest in the performance of $WTC over the next 7 years.

From Richard’s perspective, he has one fewer stakeholder to align on any key decisions, and although 3% voting power doesn’t seem much, it must be understood as a marginal 3% towards a remaining gap of the 50% he needs to control the company. There are other long term holder individuals like Charles Gibbon (5.23%, Board Member) and Michael Gregg (3.02%, Retired Board Member), so if these remain aligned with RW, then he only needs to have another 5% behind him to essentially be in control.

Another implication is that it should put at rest any question that Richard’s sell downs have been due to a desire to reduce his exposure to $WTC. He’s just added back a couple of years worth of selling down!

The market seems to be OK with this, too. Given that Maree’s sell down was to Richard, I am too. It doesn’t affect my willingness to buy back at the right price.

Disc: Not held, on watch list.

I don't find anything nefarious about this at face value. It is an unusual transaction to be sure, and as @mikebrisy mentioned it is effectively a founder exit, though a lot less consequential than if RW himself headed for the stage doors.

The only Q is - how will Richard pay for it? Surely the easiest and most obvious option is selling WTC shares, though I don't know if he has a spare billion lying around that he can parlay over seven years instead.

that billion was spent on houses for mistresses, compensatory gifts to his wife, lawyer's fees and dildos hidden in flower arrangements

@Chagsy … that’s gets me to about $50m, unless the price of flowers has gone up a lot … but I think that bubble was several centuries ago.

Still, someone paid US$6.2m for a banana duct taped to a wall a week or two ago. So, who knows.