Enough questions remain unanswered about whether the US buyout groups are still interested in Coles Group, that some sort of formal statement on the exact state of play at Coles,should be requested by the securities regulator, ASIC.
There's continuing confusion about the future involvement of US buyout groups, TPG, Blackstone and Carlyle.
And investors will have to contend with some significant changes in market sentiment towards these buyout deals in US markets on Friday.
US interest rates fell as investors sought the safety of US Government bonds as bear Stearns, a big Wall Street investment bank, was forced to bail out a speculative subprime mortgage investment fund which was close to going broke.
The cost? More than $US3.2 billion; with a second, much bigger fund also in trouble.
And two bond issues on behalf of two multi-billion dollar buyouts had to be restructured at the last minute as investors refused to invest and demanded higher interest rates.
It is a sign that investors have had their fill of marginal quality debt and are demanding more and more security or quality.
And, what has this to do with the Coles situation? Well if TPG and or its two US partners, are to get the deal up, they will have to raise money here and in the US that will cost more (with higher interest rates and more equity demanded).
Liquidity is starting to dry up as interest rate spreads widen. It could cost a lot more to fund a deal at Coles. It will put pressure on TPG, and possibly Wesfarmers.
Last Thursday the TPG-led group was out of the hunt after falling out with Woolworths about a joint offer; Friday Coles says they are not out, after a TPG PR person had refused to answer questions about the true situation, except to say it sort of wasn't right. But what the true story was, he wouldn't say.
Then Friday night the PRs for TPG and the advisers for Coles started putting around a story that TPG at least was back in; just what the situation about Blackstone and Carlyle groups' attitude remained unclear.
The suggestion was that Coles advisers, Carnegie Wylie had talked them back into the deal.
Other stories suggested Coles might resort to a break up and sell-off of the company.
But then other reports Saturday morning strongly suggested that TPG's future involvement wasn't as certain.
With bids closing at 9 am this coming Saturday, June 30, some of the stories suggested TPG might be bidding on its own, with the assistance of its Myer partners, the Myer family.
The Myer family and TPG bought the Myer Department store chain from Coles. Surely they are not thinking of recreating Coles Myer, in any form, again?
Then other stories suggested that TPG's continued involvement was an interest of the buyout group's Australian management, who, along with senior Myer executives, had flown to the United States to try and win approval for a sole bid from the TPG's other partners.
This annual partners conference is being held in Aspen, Colorado.
The cost would be around $19 to $20 billion but it would have to be considerably more than what Wesfarmers could offer, with its valuable share component of its offer.
The price would have to be well in advance of the $16.47 Wesfarmers has on the table.
Coles shares Friday fell to $16.53 – just above Wesfarmers' $16.47-a-share offer. That's a long way from the high of $17.95, when it seemed a genuine auction was on the cards.
TPG has to convince Woolworths to pay more than it wants to for the likes of Officeworks or Target.
Wesfarmers doesn't: it has a stable group with Macquarie Bank, European buy-out fund Permira and the very active Australian private equity fund, Pacific Equity Partners(PEP has pushed its deal with the management of Flight Centre to the starting time).
