MARC HASENFUSS: Trustco’s Quinton’s long wait
To justify a R3.6bn price tag, Huso will need to produce a truckload of carats — and fairly quickly, while Brian Joffe's investment company eyes Holdsport
It’s been the best part of two years and Namibian investment company Trustco has still not finalised its eyebrow-raising acquisition of the Huso diamond-mining exploration entity. A mining licence — a fairly important document — remains outstanding. Readers will remember that these mining assets belong to the CEO and founder of Trustco, Quinton van Rooyen, who is due a R3.6bn settlement via the issue of Trustco paper. The value of the Huso deal is still larger than Trustco’s R3.1bn market capitalisation — and I can’t wait for it to be brought to book to see if it’s a costly clanger or a game changer. There are more than a few observers (myself included) who will be surprised to see the mining venture hit the profit targets that must be achieved to trigger the issuing of large tranches of new shares to Van Rooyen. To justify a R3.6bn price tag (that’s almost 10 times bigger than JSE-listed Trans Hex Group), Huso will need to produce a truckload of carats — and fairly quickly, too. Bu...
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