Member Info for Boyobach

There are clearly ongoing technical problems with this BB which have been evident for much of this week.
Some posts seem to be received - appear against my name but do not land on the RDS page for some time time, only to disappear sporadically. Presumably problems with the various servers used to deliver the service. Makes it hardly worth the effort of posting. My apologies if duplicate posts appear from me.

RDS was more resilient today than I expected, Char. BP dropped further without the excuse of ex div. When I saw that RDS wasn’t going to follow it and was finding reasonable support around 110 I decided to re-buy yesterday’s tranche (still making 2x dividend net of costs). https://invst.ly/st4mz

The Pfizer vaccine is no silver bullet - lots of logistical and technical issues, especially given that two shots required. Alternatives will be needed and we may yet see a pull-back as the issues sink-in. The US election should have a net benefit for RDS - better global trade stability and less encouragement for US shale. Biden is no ‘Marxist’ - which is label that the Republicans constantly use as a sloppy argument which dupes a lot of ignorant Americans. He’s no further left than many Republicans in reality.

I think you may have missed your chance of getting RDS at a tenner, unless OP ducks below $39 again. But I would say that wouldn’t I as I’m now fully overweight again? GL

RDS has been surprisingly resilient so far today - BP fell further and without the excuse of ex-div adjustment.
It was still possible to make 2x the dividend with little difficulty (net of costs).
The Pfizer vaccine is no silver bullet - significant logistical problems and unknown long-term efficacy. Let's hope a better solution comes along.

I decided to take my profits today on the tranche of RDS I recently acquired around 900, approximately 20% of my total RDS holding. I had hoped it would go a bit higher - 1190 seemed possible at one stage but the recent surge seems to be losing steam and, in view of ex-div tomorrow, I think bigsmoke’s mention of a pullback was understandable.
Here is RDS against the others since early June: https://invst.ly/sstil , where, together with Chevron, it remains ahead of BP and Exxon. I will reacquire if there is a suitable opportunity over the next week or so but, as I remain slightly overweight in RDS, I’m equally content if it resumes upwards.

BS is presumably referring to the fact that going ex-div would provide a downward nudge if the sp has reached a level of resistance. Indeed, today's price action suggest that there may be some selling into (ahead of) ex-div and the lift triggered by this week's vaccine news may have reached its limit.

A good day for all today, O&G companies especially. And whilst G may not have risen as much as the majors, it’s worth remembering that they lost a lot more ground after their Q2 results and had been in a strong down-trend since June 8th, which only dragged G down by half as much: https://invst.ly/srr19
So, by that measure, G still leads this particular pack even if today it wasn’t keeping up with DNO: https://invst.ly/srr4p

A very good day, obviously - so what did it achieve in terms of the bigger picture?

In terms of ‘Q4 Performance’ RDS has kept its lead over the others and is effectively 20% up on its position pre their collective Q3 results (26/10):
https://invst.ly/srpyd
However, its short-term lead over Chevron masks the fact that the latter never dropped quite so low. When viewed over the period from June 8th we get a more realistic context: https://invst.ly/srpzb

In that view, Chevron is giving RDS a run for its money in the race back to last spring’s prices. Likewise, despite a slightly better showing than any of the others today, BP still lags the pack in terms of longer term recovery. Exxon was up, of course, but it does appear that BP has a good chance of overtaking it in the recovery to early June’s prices.

All of which seems to be in line with the notion that those that fall fastest sometimes recover quickest and that RDS, as a rather measured plodder in the otherwise volatile world of O&G, may not necessarily lead the pack all the way back to early June’s prices - which for RDS would be north of £13.

Re LSE: You know something is happening in the market when LSE’s chat crashes along with Investing.com’s charts. I don’t use either for investing transactions but hope their trading section was holding up a bit better.

Prussell:

When an investment goes down in value most people focus on the loss and the likelihood of a recovery. However, this approach overlooks the remaining capital and whether there would be better ways of investing it. Only when that, sometimes uncomfortable question, has been answered can you objectively consider whether to add more. When ‘averaging down’ is done as an instinctive reaction based on ‘it can’t go much lower and must go back up’ then it is often the start of a slippery slope into compounded losses.

FWIW, I doubt that you would get a much better rate of return on your remaining investment if you moved it elsewhere. The risks of it going back down seem to be easing and I do think the bottom has been seen. Would I add at this stage if my circumstances were as you describe? Quite possibly- however, my actual average is probably lower than yours and I already added as much as I’m prepared to at around £9. My strategy is to retain my core holding and to losslessly trade a percentage as the price increases - ie selling individual tranches at peaks without loss and re-acquire them at a lower price in the troughs if the opportunity arises. My ultimate target is to minimise the average cost per share of my core holding in the £10-£12 range (I’m currently below £13) whilst the market price progresses beyond £15 - which I regard as a realistic medium-term target.

Do I think it will touch £20 again? To be blunt about it, RDS was not doing well in the latter half of 2019 before COVID struck and was already at the low end of its ‘normal’ range. COVID may prove to be the stimulus RDS needed to address other challenges. It clearly has a long way to go to recapture £20 but my strategy does not depend on it getting there.

Exxon appears to be on a different long term path to RDS and it will be interesting to see which approach proves to be more successful. This article from last week covers Exxon’s Q3 results, prospects for the continuation of its dividend, potential shale write-offs and lack of ‘green’ strategy. It contrasts Exxon with BP, Shell and Chevron:

“Exxon is under pressure from critics to reset its climate strategy. Its European rivals have all committed to some form of carbon neutrality by mid-century but earlier this month Woods underscored his faith in fossil fuels. Oil and gas will still make up about half the global energy mix in 2040 and provide the most cost-effective pathway to development in poor countries, Woods told employees in the email.”

https://www.rigzone.com/news/wire/xom_warns_of_30b_shale_writedown-30-oct-2020-163716-article/

So you'll only be breaking even if yesterday's closing price holds through to Wednesday? Let's hope the next three days sees an uplift then. GL

Ultimately it turned out to be a bad week for G: https://invst.ly/squb7
Everything was up - even BP, which went ex-div on Thursday. But against a week’s rise in Brent of about 4.5%, G slipped by about 1.8%. Let’s hope ex-div only delivers a proportionate and temporary effect next week.

The closing price today is close enough to my nominal value of 980 for Brent at $40 to not cause me any alarm. Of the usual gang of four, RDS remains the leader measured from just prior to the group’s Q3s.
https://invst.ly/sqtku
BP went ex-div yesterday, which pushed the sp back down to parity with Exxon over the period. Exxon goes xd on the 10th, I believe, with RDS two days later and Chevron on the 18th. So in a fortnight’s time the playing field will have evened out sufficiently to give a clear idea of the pecking order.
Meanwhile, it has to be said that RDS remains the basket case in my portfolio: The current price is too low to warrant selling any and too high to merit adding, so trading it isn’t an attractive proposition right now. It also appears to have settled in the 950-1000 range, with any volatility (trading opportunities) likely to be based more on the capricious state of OP and the whims of the market rather than underlying factors and trends specific to the company. Not very entertaining.

Indeed winsome - size does not guarantee longevity and few organisations continue indefinitely in their original form. Change and adaptation are essential - some are successful and some are not.

Someone here pointed out that wind turbines ‘ironically’ require oil. Well, there are very few large machines that operate continuously without lubrication. However, the ratio of fuel to lubricants required to power our world is considerable, hence WD40 is a rather smaller outfit than RDS.

At any given time, somewhere on this rock, the sun is shining, the wind is blowing and the tide is moving: there is 24x7 energy available across this planet. Humankind will eventually have to get to grips with global solutions for energy generation, storage and transmission. Now that will be Mega. In the meantime, RDS will need to use the next couple of decades wisely if it is to adapt successfully

Following the Q3 results it looks as though RDS is settling into a steady trading range with OP weakening and resuming its day to day influence. I doubt that £10+ will be seen whilst Brent remains below $42.
https://invst.ly/sqmec

Hey Especial - you changed the subject - we were talking about the US right?
Are their political leaders brilliant? - No, yet they are selected by very well funded party machines. So no excuses.
Are the UK's leaders brilliant in comparison? - different subject, demonstrably not brilliant but rather better than the US offering - the bar is pretty low, after all.

Sure, the US is full of brilliant minds, just look at their septuagenarian Presidential candidates - the best their respective parties can muster.

All the details are in the RNS dated 29th Oct. - link to RNS's just above here
12 November for ex-div

Yes Barrie - agree with your dividend point. It's also why I'm not expecting the rocket of the last few days to keep going - much as I'd like it to!
I'm also certain the OP ratio is non-linear. I think it may have been above 30p per $1 at times when RDS' sp was over £20. It's just a model I use to try and separate real shifts in RDS as opposed to the noise caused by OP - it's not intended to be highly accurate and I'll tweak it whenever it starts to give inconsistent indications.

Er, no.... neat question BD!
Erdogan maybe? I kinda hope not.

Fair point JL. How the devil are you?

I guess we weren’t expecting much different - nor was the market by the looks of it.
I must say that the overdue amount, at $145m, is 45% more than my estimate last Friday - so they were performing much better than I thought during the ‘missing months’, averaging just over $30m per month production plus $6m per month overrides. Pity they weren’t being paid for it!!

I did like this line re Sarta - as mentioned by Rangor - : ‘with potentially far more to come as we appraise what could be the largest field in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.’ ATB