There are some major players owning the EPS, including AMP, Hastings and QIC. The problem for them is that the sheer scale of the equity raisings will effectively crystallise their current positions and limit their upside.

They are pondering whether BBI could survive with less equity – creating more upside for them – while knowing that a smaller capital injection would also leave them exposed to greater risk.

The BBI transaction may be the first significant deal where anyone has suggested that a group can raise too much equity, or that investors have expressed a preference for greater rather than less leverage in order to retain leverage to the upside.

That may be an indication of how significantly the market and sentiment have turned. Earlier this year returns and dilution weren’t priorities for investors more concerned about simple survival.

There doesn’t seem to be any violent disagreement with the view that the Brookfield proposal would permanently de-risk BBI and leave it with a scaled-down, but still substantial and attractive, portfolio. The dissenters are focused on the degree of danger rather than the direction.

Grant Samuel, which deemed the proposal fair and reasonable, made it clear that the situation, when viewed from the security holders’ perspective, was anything but straightforward and that the extreme leverage in BBI and a wide range of asset values meant relatively small movements in asset values in either direction could have very significant implications for them.

There is a group of hedge funds represented by RBS hovering in the background with a proposal, dismissed by BBI, for a somewhat smaller equity injection. If the larger EPS holders were to vote down the Brookfield proposal, they’d need a fallback option.

While they might be prepared to contemplate taking on more risk than envisaged in the Brookfield proposal, they presumably wouldn’t want to flirt with the risk of an early administration.