Put option.... Yes or No?This is a no-brainer. The Dover deal was signed and approved in 2010 and is potentially the last oil-sands acquisition to be permitted by a state owned companies after our gvmt. changed the foreign-takeover rules.
Hell yes! Petro China would be brain dead to not exercise the option. I would venture a guess that the stock pops once the deal is announced. "Buy steak when it is cheap" says Mr. Buffet.
Worst case scenario: should the put option not get exercised Athabasca has other ways to raise money, including tapping equity and debt markets, signing joint venture deals and selling assets. They still have great assets!
Also
For what it is worth this is what TDWaterhouse says about ATH's fundamentals
EPS growth at ATH is improving and is above the industry average. The most recent EPS was $0.58, an increase of 80.63% over the previous year.
Investors have average growth expectations for ATH given its PE ratio of 13.37, near the Oil & Gas Exploration & Production industry average of 31.99. Analysts have a negative view of the company's future prospects with a forward PE ratio of -52.07.
ATH has one of the highest ROEs of all companies in the Oil & Gas Operations industry. Breaking down the ROE, ATH has a profit margin of 260.65%, an asset turnover of 2.36 and leverage of 1.26.
This company does not pay a dividend
ATH has been able to gain market share by growing revenues faster than the industry average. This trend continues from the previous year when revenue growth at ATH and the Oil & Gas Exploration & Production industry were 532.19% and 26.90%, respectively.
Everything sounds OK except the analysts negative view of the companies future prospects. I've never trusted analysts, their opinions are very biased and intentions questionable at best.
IMHO
Good luck and great wealth to all the optimists.