I would vote for a CEO who doesn't engage in making commitments about what will happen, and then dropping the ball....on top of that responsible individuals OWN their mistakes.  

DM needs to come clean with shareholders about why he got it wrong.  If he's still working on it, and if there's any chance the deal might not come to fruition, then the information should be conveyed in that manner.  Something like:

''We are working dilligently on a second licensing/partnership deal and are hopeful that we'll have an annoucement during the first quarter of 2017.  However these are complicated negotitations and we can give no assurance that a deal will come to fruition''.