yells. It's the jack of clubs. Blackjack! Brick has just won big. He continued to up his bets and continued to win the hands. Now he has as much as his brother. Ro has collected somewhat handsomely as well, just by back-betting on Brick. He knows he’s not as good at blackjack so he just stands behind Brick at the table and bets alongside Brick's hand. He’s won enough to cover his night.
After some more blackjack and many, many tapas plates washed down with more beers, the guys decide it's time to move on. Stu musters the courage to ask Kelly out. She doesn’t finish until midnight, in just over an hour. Before Stu has a chance to feel deflated Kelly suggests that she is happy to meet them if they are continuing on in the casino.
‘We were thinking of going to Mo Browns’, the bar upstairs, ‘but I think we’ll get a cognac and cigar at Castro’s first. Maybe you could meet us there and then we can head up to Mo’s?’ he offers.
‘Sure, that sounds nice. I might bring a couple of friends with me if thats ok?’
All the others guys grin.
‘Sure’, Stu smiles,’ the more the better. See you soon’.
Kelly gives Stu a quick peck on the cheek and walks off.
Stu claps his hands, ‘who’s for a cigar?’ he says commencing a brisk walk toward Castro’s cigar bar.
Ro cannot recall if he was the first to notice her but it wasn't long before all the guys did. The tuck end of their cigars dropping off unnoticed. If she looked great in her work outfit she looked simply gorgeous now. Her classic little black dress was backless, closed around the neck, sleeveless but covering the chest and short leaving her long legs, pin-like complete with black four-inch open toe heels. Her hair was free draping slightly to the front right with large round ear-rings and seductive eyes. She smiles at all the boys but greets Stu specifically with a kiss on the cheek planting her right hand on his large, solid pecks. Stu works out frequently at the gym with intensity, he’s trim and sharp with his shirt tight but not bulging.
Chapter 7 Fit For Purpose
There is nothing worse than sitting on a plane on the tarmac waiting for it to take off. Especially when it sat at the gate for ten minutes, then taxied for fifteen minutes all the way down the other end of the runway, then sat for another ten minutes waiting its turn to take off and then ten minutes in the air before the seat belt sign is turned off and busting to go to the loo! Ro was hungover and in desperate need for a piss. Seeing Stu and Kelly off to Mo Browns is the last thing Ro can remember. Luckily he made it to a taxi and was able to tell the driver where home was. He has no idea what time he made it home and into bed but it was well after midnight. He wonders what happened with Stu and Kelly. Perhaps the luckiest thing was that he heard the alarm at four o’clock in the morning and that he did make it into the shower. Certainly the over-sized individual who appeared in the aisle glancing at the seat next to Ro wasn’t too impressed by the alcoholic odour.
Ro was holding his third coffee when he entered the foyer of Jonathan Forest Discount Brokers. Sam, Clint, Jarryd and Tina were waiting in the Board room. Ro joined them not long before Jonathan and his entourage walked in. Ro was summonsed to the Product forum to discuss the operating model and product set, Clint joined the Corporate forum, Jarryd the technology forum and Tina the people and governance forum. The intent was to spend the day defining how each of the forums would operate in the combined entity, what were the key issues to be addressed, the potential cost and timeline required to make it happen. This information would be used in the terms of the deal upon acquisition. Jonathan and Sam would be joined by Alfie from Everton Marks in the Board room to discuss terms and executive roles and responsibilities going forward. Jarryd led the discussion on what the platform would look like. It didn’t take long to work out the effort to transition the technology from Jonathan Forest to Mason Thompson would be significant. Integration of the technology into Mason Thompson and the need to migrate the Mason Thompson data from Atkins Robertson to the Jonathan Forest platform were the two main issues. Possibly twelve to eighteen months and a cost of around $30million. Tina needed to consider the people changes, how many people would be required, which people may stay and which may go, estimating the cost of redundancy at about $10million and taking about three to six months to transition the Jonathan Forest people to Mason Thompson people systems including payroll. Governance would strictly follow the Mason Thompson framework and transition of existing lower quality governance systems and processes would take time and money but only about two to four months and cost about $1million, probably less.
Ro’s time in the product forum was extensive and exhaustive. Much of the time was spent with him explaining the existing business and operating model with Alex the COO from Jonathan Forest doing the same.The product set would imitate the existing product offering Mason Thompson has, getting as many deposit funds on the bank book as possible, paying a low interest rate, maximising profit margin for the business. The customer set, with active customers being mostly highly active traders means much of the revenue is centred on brokerage revenue rather than sourcing revenue across a diverse product set such as deposits, lending, foreign exchange, international share trading and asset management fees. The idea of the cross sell to Jonathan Forest customers raised many an eyebrow. The upside was that the Jonathan Forest offered better trading experiences for high frequency trading customers of Mason Thompson, but this was one per cent of the client base. It's good revenue but highly correlated to the stock market volumes. A lack of volatility would see trading volumes and revenues fall by half or even more. Mason Thompson invested much time and effort with Atkins Robertson to diversify income streams to those more reliable, more predictable such as deposits.
Lunch was provided but Sam had requested the deal team meet at the cafe down the road straight after the forum meetings to debrief on the mornings discussions. They would then be back to participate in lunch. Sam came to the conclusion that the deal was quickly heading to $150million with all the transition costs, acquisition cost of $80million, maybe more and extra internal project costs associated with completing the move to the new Jonathan Forest platform. Costs incurred by Atkins Robertson to co-ordinate the move from them to the new platform would be around $10million plus any potential termination and contract break costs which Clint was working through.
The afternoon was spent with each team presenting their findings to the combined group with questions coming from Jonathan and Sam as well as cross-forum questions being raised.
Ro was exhausted. He was keen to get back into a taxi and head home. Jarryd made a claim that he could only get a booking on a 6 o’clock flight and needed to leave right on five o’clock. Tina quickly advised that she needed to catch a taxi with him. Ro, despite the looks from Sam, was going to catch the taxi with them.
‘No worries’, Sam interjected, ’I’ll need final reports by close of business tomorrow so I can finalise the deal bid by Thursday. It needs to be approved so I can lodge it with Everton Marks by Friday when the bid process closes.
‘Have you heard anything about the other offer from the futures trading company?’, Ro added.
‘It sounds like their bid is going to be well over $100million’, replied Sam with a questioned look on his face. He believes it's quote is high.’They’re very keen to get into this market. It's a high price’, he continues.
Clint leans forward, ‘so are we in with a realistic shot at $80million?’
Sam rocks back on his chair, lets out a deep breath and says ‘If I was Jonathan Forest I wouldn’t be knocking back $20million or more to be bought by a bank. He’ll only be around for twelve months as part of the deal transition and then he’s off. Who knows’.
‘Before you go, we are on for negotiations with Oakbank next week.’ I’ll need you all available and
