RE:I believe the deal is You are correct. It is up to $10M in value of Piedmont shares and not 10M shares of Piedmont.
Good news is Piedmont is trading at near 52 week lows of $26 per share vs a high of $78 dollars a share earlier this year. Of course the value of shares is in tranches over several years likely. SIC/Benton also get a royalty.
My thinking on this is that if Piedmont begins to have good follow up drill results and can gain an understanding of the property, all the terms of the deal do not have to come to fruition for SIC to benefit. The market will allocate a value to SIC share price at some point. We will see. This deal is good overall on risk/reward and the fact SIC cannot do this themselves.
BC