Looking across my portfolio, Bailador is one that just keeps moving sideways (plus divvies) where they are screaming from the rooftops how good they are at backing winners and having conservative valuations.

Going through previous straws on Siteminder and Bailador, it seems not much has changed in the last couple years albeit a small Bailador sell down of some Siteminder (at a good price relative to today).

I am still of the opinion they should sell their Siteminder completely and return a special dividend to shareholders for them to decide whether to buy into it or not. With such a substantial position in Siteminder, it does frustrate me the amount of management fees they're taxing us plebs.

Given the broad based increase in costs across all industries and cost pressures within small - medium businesses, do we think that Siteminder will have an increase in adoption rates as owners look to tech to increase productivity?

Personally, I am still against the Prophero investment. I don't have any love for buyers agents, especially these guys who clip the ticket from those who don't know that they're getting screwed. Their customers go to them following great marketing and ultimately hand over their hard earned for sweet FA.

Also, Sol Patts has been selling down over the last few years, do we have an opinion of that?

What I like about Bailador is their size and flexibility. They are small team, not overly burdened with red tape, nimble enoughto get into small companies and get them flying along. Siteminder isn't small anymore...

Apologies if this is a little bit ranty and opinionated - can't help myself.

I am not a fan of this latest investment. For full disclosure, my profession is a Real Estate Agent and I have had dealings with this company in the past.

A $12m investment in essentially a real estate company is ludicrous and seriously brings into question my holding in BTI and support of Wilson/Kirk where I have been a long term holder.

Bull case - an anomalously high number of individuals will pay a buyers agent to source property for them. They get sucked into this 'AI' theme and Prophero can ride the next wave of the property cycle.

My expected case and opinion

Making significant money in property cannot be done by just looking at 200+ data points. It assumes rationality and a perfect market without taking into consideration actual people and the human element. AI (or in my dealings with Prophero, an outsourced international virtual assistant aggregating info from real estate agents asking them ridiculous questions and qualifying inputs) doesn't have the capacity to understand the nuances around long term movements and drivers of value in property. Yes it can look at census data and median house prices and yields and trends, but there are markets within markets and there are mountains of data points which are not readily available.

AI doesn't know there's a new cafe down the road which is run by a really slick operator, or the local bowls club becoming the next big thing because the new chef is a legend. It doesn't know the council is planning on redoing the pedestrian bridge over the busy road which opens up an entire pocket of houses to be more desirable to young families walking to school. It doesn't know that farmers have had another stellar year with their crops and that they all go and purchase off farm investments in the form of an apartment by the beach.

Looking at the statistics as well doesn't help. A computer doesn't know if a property has been renovated. It doesn't know if it was renovated by an owner who has no trade experience or if it has the best quality marble benchtops ever created!

It is amazing how many people think they are property gurus because they purchased a house for $1m, spent $100k on a reno by painting and gardening, maybe removing a wall, putting in some furniture and then selling for $1.5m thinking they are the best thing ever. What they fail to realise is that if they did nothing to the same property it would have been worth $1.4m and they've just ridden the market in the 2 years it's taken them to do the work.

The only way this investment in Prophero can fly is if BTI have picked the bottom of the market and see a significant rise in transactions combined with some incredible marketing to get people to sign up to their platform.

There is no substitute for doing your own work and local knowledge of a local area. These companies a predatory and inject themselves into a process without adding superior value.

phew - rant over and I feel better now.