Snippet22 Jun 2014 10:40
I had lunch yesterday in Bristol with an old pal from the oil industry. A few months ago his AIM listed company tied to raise a few hundred thousand pounds and boy was it hard work. The other day he raised well over a million quid and he said he could have done it twice over. Has anything changed with his company? Not really. This is just sentiment.
However, I caution that this is not a change that has affected all oil stocks on AIM. The bigger more cumbersome plays have so disgraced themselves with executive greed (I think particularly here of the pigs on the Northern Petroleum (NOP) board awarding themselves bonuses after racking up record losses) and operational failure in recent years that they still cannot be forgiven.
Instead it is the tiny pure exploration play with no pretention of becoming integrated E&P’s that are flying. Mosman Oil & Gas, Tangiers Petroleum, Astar etc have all raced ahead in the past week. Mosman actually found something with the other two it is just anticipation and in the case of Astar bogus RNS releases. What exactly has Mosman found? Well we do not know, but the mood music now is “buy quickly, ask questions later” which is a total change from a few months ago.
Having been a no-go area for years UK onshore is now suddenly hot once again – hence excitement at UK Oil & Gas (UKOG) – where RMPC owns shares - and with the Egdon/Alkane deal and as it happens also for my lunching companion.
So do we chase it? I am not. I had almost forgotten about my UK shares which were bought as a favour to a mate in a placing last year. I think there I a case that they will have a very good short term run given its own promised newsflow and the new mood music but pure E plays can never be described as value investments. They are dependent on drill bit success – which ultimately is a gamble not a value judgement – and also on sentiment. Were, for instance, the Mosman find not to be all that it is hyped up to be and Tangiers **** or glory exploration well to be a duster, sentiment could change quickly for the worse.
So on my Nifty Fifty site we will sit on the sidelines. That might look foolish as punters bank quick and big turns but they are gambling. Steve and I prefer to invest. But no-one can deny that right now for the small oils, the force and momentum are on their side.
- See more at: http://www.shareprophets.advfn.com/views/6129/how-quickly-sentiment-changes-ref-small-oil-stocks-the-force-is-with-them#sthash.dSjJlIMh.2V1fjNrU.dpuf
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