The liquidators for bankrupt Bermuda-based LaSalle Re Holdings Limited have been ?unable to take a position? on a tender offer to buy 1.5 million preferred shares or 50 percent of the outstanding preferred shares of the company at a price of $1 each.

LaSalle Cover Company LLC an investment partnership between Costa Brava Partnership III, L.P. and White Bay Capital Management LLC said last December that the tender offer to Series A Preferred Shareholders was 300 percent premium over the closing price on the shares on December 22, 2004.

LaSalle Cover Company LLC, which is not affiliated with LaSalle Re Holdings or any other insurance company, also said that acceptance of the offer would provide holders with a cash price for their preferred shares that is ?substantially above the published prices? since they were delisted from trading on the New York Stock Exchange on March 25, 2003 and since the company?s Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing on August 23, 2003.?

LaSalle Cover Company said that the price of the tender offer represents a 639 percent premium over the average daily closing prices for the fourth quarter of 2004 through December 22, 2004.

In addition it represents a 618 percent premium over the average daily closing prices for the 2004 calendar year through December 22, 2004.

One year later, however Michael Morrison and John Wardrop, the joint provisional liquidators from KPMG who are charged with ascertaining, collecting, and maintaining the assets of the company, said they were unable to take a position on the investment firm?s offer because there are ?not charged? with taking a position on any third party tender offer for equity securities in the company.

They also lack sufficient assets to fund an adequate investigation of the financial underpinnings or rationale of the offer.

The liquidators said that while they have no information to disagree with the claim that shareholders will not receive a ?return on their investment in the near term, if at all,? they have not conducted an analysis to determine if that statement remains accurate.