More musings, if you have the time and patience...
Adding to my weeks and weeks of public conjecture here and moreso on my Seeking Alpha KAT Blog that this DRC tax mess would get resolved, consider these 3 points: 1. Gcamines is a joke. If anyone thinks this entity and it's senior Management including Chairman Albert Yuma, have any capacity whatsoever to be a cornerstone building block for an "OPEC" style nationalisation of DRC's valuable Cobalt endowment, they are on the kool-aid and/or have no idea what they are doing and should by all rights, stick to owning shares in Walmart (or whatever) rather than complex DRC equities like KAT. Gcamines annual Cu output peaked at about 500k tonnes in the late 1980's and last year it mined just 10k tonnes despite repeated promises to dramatically scale up production. This Kinshasa petty cash piggy bank (my words) company has zero credibility: no capacity to ever find new assets (and they are surrounded by massive opportunity); no capacity or track record to raise money TRANSPARENTLY; no capacity or track record to build anything - nevermind Mines - and no ability or track record to hire and retain brilliant Mining professionals. In a damning report late last year, the US based Watchdog, The Carter Center, called Gcamines a financial black box. More like "black hole" I'd say. Their report claimed that the "state mining company failed to internally register $740 million in income between 2011-2014, much of which is now untraceable". It further stated "the amount makes up two-thirds of the $1.1 billion that the copper producer was entitled to collect from international mining partners during that period and there is no evidence how half of it was spent". Yuma had nothing to say rather he blamed those very same foreign mining partners Gcamines has deals with, Gcamines stating it hold(s) its partners accountable. Enough said. 2. If you know anything about Africa, you will have noted the soft coup that (finally) brought about the sacking of Mugabe in Zimbabwe and the internal ANC power struggles that too (finally), brought to an end the "leadership" joke that was Jacob Gedleyihlekisa Zuma. Subsequently, and in just a few short weeks, in both countries, you are seeing a marked improvement in sentiment towards mining and mining investment, from Chambers of Mines to Unions and Ministries. In SA, new President Cyril Ramaphosa is a local mining success story: a billionaire yes, but an individual of honest and sound conviction and a gentleman cut from the same cloth as Mandela: certainly very capable of leading the country (as was Mandela's wish before being hijacked by ANC old guard). In this light, how does one honestly see it possible that the DRC will (ever) go in an opposite direction? I certainly don't. Never did. Not going to happen. 3. And lastly: Kabila: Firstly, things are moving in Kinshasa. Last week Kabila named his party Secretary General, Henri Mova Sakanyi, as the new Interior Minister and Deputy P.M. replacing Emmanuel Ramazani Shadari who had been in the post since Dec. 2016. Note Shadari is one of 16 senior members of the Kabila regime on an EU sanctions list. Speculation has it that Kabila's reforms include the abolition of the Party Secretary General post to allow for a party President; a position observers speculate Kabila himself will assume. So even though Kabila's 2 terms are over, he is not going anywhere anytime soon. Secondly and lastly, do you not know where Baar is? Its in Switzerland. It's where Glencore has been headquartered. Forever. And who do you think Zuma has as his Private Bankers? And who do you think Mugabe has as his Private Bankers? And who do you think are Kabila's? The Swiss, that's who... ** My concluding point here is that you had better not bet against Glencore as the Swiss have all the secrets and are trusted custodians of much of the money ** It's as simple as that. Kabila will be "assisted" by his Swiss friends to help them to retain his "off shore PENSION" so long as he plays ball. Given the final removal of 2 of his counterparts recently namely in Zimbabwe & SA, he will play... These are my views only. Thanks for reading.