realistic The expectation of news of a deal soon is unrealistic. Possible but unlikely.
Buyout due diligence can take quite some time.
If there was a tentative deadline for signing a CA to see the data, why would it not be extended for a possible bidder for deep pockets?
And would they allow only one bid per customer instead of having the bidders bid a second or third time, trying to top each other?
We don't know the procedure.
We don't know how many companies will make a bid.
We don't know how many of the bids were competitively priced.
When you don't know these kind of details, predictions of when we will hear about a bid or a stage of the bidding are just wishful thinking, unsupported by facts.
As for $3 or above being the price, we know that the CEO, whose fiduciary duty is to get shareholders the best deal, had the Board award him a $3 million bonus if he could get the deal at $3 or more. If that is NOT a pure undeserved money grab by the CEO, then a $3 price is a hurdle that needs a management incentive to be crossed, according to the Board that over 70% of AGM voters supported.
And while there may have been a $4 offer that I don't know about, we all know about the $2.50 unsolicited offer made by AQN. This was rejected by WND Management, without even entering into talks to try to get the price raised over $3. This is what rightfully enraged the Hedge Funds, since the fiduciary duty of Management should have been to see how high AQN would go before making a decision to reject their overture.
Hopefully Management will run the bidding process in a way that leads to the highest buyout price. I do not think they are going to run it in a way to get information out to shareholders as soon as possible, because hand-holding is not a priority.
IMO the reason we heard about how many companies were looking at the data and considering offers was that this was part of the PR campaign to retain the votes of the shareholders in the face of the dissident revolt. If there had been no AGM Proxy fight, that information would likely not have been made public. Now that the pressure is off, there is no need to release non-material information, although selective leaks that would lead to more aggressive bidding would likely be welcomed by shareholders.