I believe the statement along the lines of (This property practically pays for its exploration costs) was bantied about quite freely by management.

Tesoro IMO would still be actve and SP would still be in the 0.25 to o.45 range if a cash flow other than PP was still available.

A good CEO would have IMO persued the cash flow incentive by small scale mining as a shelter from the drlll results.

Instead this CEO halted the project midstream and divested SLI of other promising properties for suspect returns.

I know you dont need a refresher on where SLI was but here it is. And for the life of me the only logical and valid explanation to me is found at the top of the SLI Food Chain.

http://www.marketwired.com/press-release/St-Elias-Mines-Ltd-Tesoro-Gold-Project-Peru-The-Plan-980238.htm