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Eeeek! That's just like the little village we lived in my childhood! You know, here in crowded Finland (5 million inhabitants) young families with children and retired people are RUSHING to the countryside. The prices of houses and building plots (right??) in little villages have risen manyfolds! That tells what people really want.
You are lucky to have that place in REAL countryside. If we did not have this little cottage in the natural park area near Helsinki, I would be going too.
Music has a very powerful impact on me I have noticed. If I feel down, powerless, sorry, I put on Beethoven's pianoconcerto No.5 "The Emperor" - and lo and behold, soon I feel like Emperor!
My love and knowledge (er..minor) for classical music also comes from my childhood: every Thursday night the whole family (six kids!) listened to a classical music concert from the radio (we played chess, Monopoly, Backgammon while listening). My mother played the piano (she was a teacher) and the whole family sang with her on Christmas, Easter, National Day, on birthdays, family parties. In teenage it was not always much fun (and we listened to the Radio Luxemburg/Rock Around the Clock every time we had a chance late in the night), but I am very glad we had that "classical education". It has no way disturbed my excellent ability to enjoy rock'nroll, hillbilly, boogiewoogie, countrymusic, soul:) Anything goes!
Now that we have heard much of music Harvey (and I) like, what is your favourite, Stock Lobster? What music would you take with you to a desert island?
Annoying?? If somebody gets annoyed of the music posts please click "Tools" in the upper bar, then click "My settings" and then click "Off" at "Play Embedded Sounds". Then just click pass the posts with music if you don't want to listen.
Those who want to listen the music in a post just click the link "Suppressed Sound Link" and there you go! You can listen to nice background music at the same time you are planning your next trades. You know how music can inspire you!!
Let's ask Stock Lobster to post some boogiewoogie to get our mojo working on Monday morning just before the bell rings, and let's discuss the effect later...
Here's GDOCF's PR about the loss:
Published: 08:56 02.07.2007 GMT+2 /HUGIN /Source: Golden Ocean Group /OSE: GOGL /ISIN: BMG4032A1045
GOGL - Declaration of Newbuilding Options and loss on FFA trading
Golden Ocean Group Limited ("Golden Ocean" or the "Company") will in the second quarter of 2007 realise a loss on freight derivative activities of $15 million. $7 million of this loss has been realised in the second quarter of 2007 while the remaining part of the loss is adjustments for market to market valuations on future positions, mostly short positions. Part of this loss has arisen as a function of hedging of forward open physical positions. Going forward the Company expects these losses to be compensated by increased earnings from physical spot trading.
As per today the Company has 35% open Panamax exposure for the remainder of 2007 and 60% open Panamax exposure for 2008.
The Company is further pleased to advise that the Company has exercised its option for two additional ice class Panamax vessels at Pipavav Shipyard in India. The vessels of 75,000 dwt will be delivered during the first half of 2010. The agreed purchase price is $36 million per vessel.
The management of Golden Ocean finds price and time of delivery attractive and furthermore considers ice class strengthening to have an added commercial value going forward.
Hamilton, Bermuda
July 2, 2007
Contact Persons:
Herman Billung: CEO, Golden Ocean Management AS
+47 22 01 73 40
Geir Karlsen: CFO, Golden Ocean Management AS
+47 22 01 73 53
GDOCF recently announced loss of $15 million in their 2Q hedging. Spot prices did not fall as they/everybody expected. It did not cause much reaction in the market - a slight notch in price for a couple of days. But everybody knows they have evened their loss in higher spot prices and - I would guess - in other derivatives.
I meant I read the IBD article YOU posted here:
"Creek Shipping Company Plots a Choppy Course to Profit Growth"
DRYS might have information about hedging against spot prices on their website. I'm going to look.
GDOCF has only part of their vessels on spot market (don't know exactly the current situation), and the vessels are hedged. The hedged funds are already taken into consideration in all GDOCF's financials (oh gosh, I hope you understand my English).
DRYS. You see Economou uses the same strategy as John Fredriksen (FRO, GDOCF, SDRLF): He/the management owns 47% (JF always owns about 30% of his companies) of the shares, and the company pays good dividends to ALL shareholders. They put their dividend money back into the company and buy more ships, which earn more income and so on. They do not dilute.
FRO has a lot of cash now (good voyage revenues, sold some ships), so 2Q dividends might be good - or JF has other plans. Must wait for a PR.
Is it Good Morning or Good Evening, Stock Lobster? You are already up?? You apparently have the Midnight Sun-effect also in NS :)
Is Ashley having a vacation at all or has she already had it? I know working people in America have much shorter vacations as the Europeans. We have 4-5 weeks vacation - 4 in summer and 1 in wintertime. Apparently the officials have come to the conclusion we need it here... Lol
I read the Economou interview. DRYS is operating now totally on spot-market, which can be very, very profitable (and very unprofitable too in times), but I wonder why he did not mention that they certainly are very strongly hedged against unprofitable development in spot-market (or are they??). I think shareholders should know it.
Did you notice that TOPT is moving to dry bulk market too? Evidently they see bright times for bulkers ahead. Keep an eye on GDOCF. Closed at $4.00 on Friday and the volume is rising. GDOCF has almost the same number of vessels than DRYS.
Yes, Helsinki has grown from a little town to a "city" with 500.000 inhabitants - a Goldie Lock scenario to me: not too little but not too much people. Copenhagen has its own charm - I love it - Danish people are excellent in their "savoir vivre".
Thanks to the Gulf Stream we can enjoy our midnight sun here in Scandinavia in far more pleasant circumstances than e.g. Greenland people. The ports along Norwegian coast are open the whole winter, and in recent years we have not had much use for our icebreakers in Gulf of Bothnia. Greenhouse effect?? Please, don't change the direction, Gulf Stream!
Thank you for all the music tonight. I love to hear different interpretations of favourite concertos, and for that Internet gives apparently a good opportunity.
I thought it is Anne-Sophie Mutter - she is a fantastic. Also her violin is fantastic, a masterpiece Stradivarius and you can hear it!
There's another fabulous Anne Sofie, the Swedish singer Anne Sofie von Otter. She sings opera, lieds, medieval songs but listen to her interpretation of Kurt Weil's song "Surabaya Johnny". It's on her CD-album "Speak Low". It is - fantastic.
In Helsinki sun sets at 10.32 PM and rises at 4.20AM.
In Rovaniemi (at Arctic Circle) sunset is at 12.07 AM and sun rises at 2.39 AM. In middle Lapland (68th of northern latitude) or more north the sun shines through the night. People sleep considerably less than in wintertime.
Who is playing the Beethoven concerto?
Lol. You can't always please everyone.
How can you post the music? Is it a program/application?
Thank you Stock Lobster! Sitting on veranda... looking over the lake smooth as glass... listening to Segovia. It's half past ten o'clock here in the evening.
More, more, more..
Harvey and I seem to have very similar taste for music. What other pieces are on the record? Can you post them?
That country office looks like a paradise! And I do not only mean Harvey's girlfriend... Nova Scotia is still on much more southern levels than Scandinavia, you can see it on the vegetation. How long are you going to stay there?
Well, trying to keep up and please three girlfriends takes its toll...
BTW. What music was Harvey listening early in the morning in your previous post? What's on the CD in the picture?
GM Stock Lobster. BQI's today's behaviour was to be expected. Thursday's rally was due to news, which begin to confirm BQI's huge possibilities (and to great part due to Stock Lobster's Magic Touch!). I'm glad that many board members/readers found this little gem. BQI is a good possibility to bring money in a longer term portfolio). IMO the share is beginning now a slow but steady climb.
Oil sands start to look more and more attractive to big oil companies. New cheaper extraction methods are being developed all the time to lessen the cost of the whole procedure. New oil discoveries are harder and harder to find, and they are small - at least what have been found in recent years. They have to drill incredibly deep in sea (Gulf of Mexico!) or in a very harsh environment (Barents Sea), and it is becoming really expensive. Think about dayrates of $500.000 of drilling rigs (I have even heard of $1.2 mm in Arctic district!). A couple of years ago the dayrates of best ocean rigs were $100.000-150.000.
A JV can come sooner than we think. Better keep an eye on those big companies kicked out of Venezuela (Exxon, Chevron).
And as to a hostile takeover, BQI has a poison pill to protect its shareholders: the taker has to pay $20/share to a shareholder. This shows that the company is quite confident with its future.
Xanadu
I'm fine, thank you. So you live in the Eastern Central time zone? Don't know where I got the impression that you live somewhere in western parts of USA.
GM Stuffit. You are up early! What time is it by you now?
Good morning St. Lobster. Good morning folks.
BQI Chris Hopkins, CEO of BQI, had a presentation at TD Newcrest Oil Sands Conference in Calgary, Alberta yesterday afternoon, and he mentioned there that the Axe Lake Discovery area (OBIP 2.5 billion barrels of bitumen) is estimated to be "commercially viable" already in Q4 in 2008. I think that eigentlich this is the best news. Axe Lake area is only about 30 miles east from Suncor's Firebag operational area, so it feels truly reasonable BQI can begin to produce heavy oil there and get it to the market.
This news may have boosted the afternoon buying. Let's hope the price keeps its support near the closing price ($3.41).
BQI. Here's a link to the PDF presentation of today's news just released on the BQI website:
http://oilsandsquest.com/investor_information/presentations/OQI_TD_Conf_12_07_07.pdf
Have a nice evening.
Oh-hoh. I certainly didn't fall asleep starring that BQI! This run may go on tomorrow, when people find the news. The price of oil barrel $1.00 is the asset value of ESTIMATED bitumen in the drilled area made by the management of BQI. The official confirmation of the bitumen quantity & quality made by an independent research institute will come in September/October, and then the calculated share price $25 - $35 will be "confirmed".
Last time (in August 2006) the estimation of the management of the bitumen in the then drilled area was 250 million barrels. The official research later confirmed 495 million barrels of bitumen! The estimates of the management have always been conservative, and so can be the estimate of 10 billion barrels today. (Let's hope so :)
We'll see in Sept/Oct.
BQI. A calculation: "10 billion barrels X 54% to 83% recovery = 5.4 b to 8.3 billion barrels X $1.00 per recoverable barrel = $5.4 b to $8.3 b market cap / 236 million fully-diluted shares = $23 to $35 stock price = 674% to 1078% upside!!!!!!"
NOTE: Price of oil barrel $1.00. I should say $2.00 :)
Breakeven price for oilsand oil barrel is generally estimated at $45 for the time being. $72 (price of oil barrel now) minus $45 = $27. Do the math.
Somebody must have read BQI's PR today!
BQI sure should look fine today. Estimated resources 10 BILLION barrels of bitumen in a fraction area of their permits!! (Experts say it's a modest estimate).
Yes, nice going. But are those NASDAQ, AMEX, NASD, CBOE also MMs? Are they playing with those 100 share trades?
Stock Lobster. Can you see L2 for BQI? Who are those MMs? Why so much 100 trades? Ty.
Hello $treetTrader.
BQI Oilsands Quest estimates resource potential of its Saskatchewan and adjacent Alberta permits
Thursday July 12, 7:00 am ET
Amex: BQI
CALGARY, July 12 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ - Oilsands Quest Inc. (Amex: BQI - News) announces management's estimate of resource potential of 10 billion barrels of bitumen for its contiguous oil sands exploration permits in northwest Saskatchewan and northeast Alberta. This estimate includes management's estimate of Original Bitumen In Place (OBIP) for the Axe Lake Discovery on its Saskatchewan permits as well as management's estimate of resource potential on certain portions of the remainder of its Saskatchewan permits and its adjacent Alberta permits.
Management's estimate of resource potential, 10 billion barrels, is based on the following evaluations:
- Axe Lake Discovery area: Management's estimate of OBIP for Axe Lake
is 1.4 to 1.5 billion barrels and its estimate of additional resource
potential for Axe Lake is 0.7 to 1.3 billion barrels, for a total
potential bitumen resource of 2.1 to 2.8 billion barrels. (This total
estimate has been rounded to 2.5 billion barrels for ease of
reference). The independent consultant's estimate of OBIP for the Axe
Lake Discovery will be completed in the fall of 2007.
- Other portions of the company's Saskatchewan permits: Management's
estimate of additional resource potential for selected areas outside
the Axe Lake Discovery area (areas to the south and northeast) is
3.0 billion barrels.
- Adjacent Alberta permits: Management's estimate of the resource
potential for approximately two townships of the company's adjacent
permits in Alberta is 4.5 billion barrels.
BQI Oilsands Quest estimates resource potential of its Saskatchewan and adjacent Alberta permits
Thursday July 12, 7:00 am ET
Amex: BQI
CALGARY, July 12 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ - Oilsands Quest Inc. (Amex: BQI - News) announces management's estimate of resource potential of 10 billion barrels of bitumen for its contiguous oil sands exploration permits in northwest Saskatchewan and northeast Alberta. This estimate includes management's estimate of Original Bitumen In Place (OBIP) for the Axe Lake Discovery on its Saskatchewan permits as well as management's estimate of resource potential on certain portions of the remainder of its Saskatchewan permits and its adjacent Alberta permits.
Management's estimate of resource potential, 10 billion barrels, is based on the following evaluations:
- Axe Lake Discovery area: Management's estimate of OBIP for Axe Lake
is 1.4 to 1.5 billion barrels and its estimate of additional resource
potential for Axe Lake is 0.7 to 1.3 billion barrels, for a total
potential bitumen resource of 2.1 to 2.8 billion barrels. (This total
estimate has been rounded to 2.5 billion barrels for ease of
reference). The independent consultant's estimate of OBIP for the Axe
Lake Discovery will be completed in the fall of 2007.
- Other portions of the company's Saskatchewan permits: Management's
estimate of additional resource potential for selected areas outside
the Axe Lake Discovery area (areas to the south and northeast) is
3.0 billion barrels.
- Adjacent Alberta permits: Management's estimate of the resource
potential for approximately two townships of the company's adjacent
permits in Alberta is 4.5 billion barrels.
Good Morning, Folks. FYI:
TUG FRENZY New construction reaches "unprecedented levels"
There are more tugs operating worldwide today than at any time in the past and by all indications the fleet appears ready to grow even further over the next few years, according to a leading shipbroker.
Speaking at Marine Log's Tugs & Barges 2007 Conference & Expo held in Stamford, Conn., last month, Bob Beegle said new construction in the tug market worldwide had reached unprecedented levels, with approximately 550 vessels being built.
"The level of tug construction, both in the United States and abroad, is one of the trends that is up. Today's dramatic flurry in new contruction cannot be explained by one factor, but instead by a number of forces that normally do not come into play at the same time."
Beegle should know. He's been following the tug market for more than 25 years as president of shipbroker Marcon International, Inc., Coupeville, Wash.
http://www.marinelog.com/
- - - -
Tugs and harbour/offshore service vessels are becoming a very interesting sector in maritime industry. Majority of existing vessels are definitely too old and poorly equipped. New tugs that operate in congested ports must be much better maneuverable, and provided with totally different equipments. In addition, use of tugs in port maneuvres has become more and more essential due to the size of vessels, handling characteristics, hazardous cargos (chemicals, LNG) etc. Small new ntrepreneurs in this sector could be interesting for a longer term investment. In USA I know K-Sea Transports (KSP $47.11) and Tidewater (TDW $ 75,57) operate PSV's (Platform Supply Vessel) and tug-boats. Could be nice to find more companies. In Norway there are a couple too.
ANW = a bunker. This could be an interesting one to keep an eye on. Bunker tankers operate in harbours (and on open sea too) and deliver the fuel for vessels' own use. They certainly have work to do!
TUG was a little tug-boat company operating in harbours, and it was quickly bought out in a very profitable price.
Stock Lobster. Here are some offshore drilling stocks for a watch list. I hope you can use the ticker symbols for your list (or do you need the company names?? I do not know the system how you put up the lists).
ATW BHI CAM CBI DO ESV FTI GRP GSF GW HAL HP NBR NE PDC PDE PTEN RDC RIG SDRLF.PK SII SLB TDW THE WIN WFT
PTEN, PDC and NBR do mostly onshore drilling.
Some of these are mainly oil service and drilling equipment companies (CBI, FTI, SII, SLB, WIN).
SDRLF.PK ($22.45) belongs to Frontline conglomerate, owns both deep water semisubmersibles and jack-ups, and is growing very aggressively. Heavily traded in Oslo, but low volumes in USA. I think people simply do not know about this relatively new offshore driller. There are several drilling companies in Norway.
All very profitable companies and good long term (retirement) stocks : ).
^OSX is the Oil Service Sector Index and OIH is an ETF for Oil Service Holders - good to follow daily.
Offshore drilling - strong sector it is. Read this:
"Pride Intl to build $680 mln ultra-deepwater rig
Fri Jul 6, 2007 4:45PM EDT
July 6 (Reuters) - Pride International Inc. (PDE.N: Quote $38.50, Profile, Research) said it will construct an ultra-deepwater rig with expected fixed-price project cost of about $680 million.[|b]
The rig will be constructed by Samsung Heavy Industries Co. Ltd. (010140.KS: Quote, Profile, Research) and is expected to be delivered from the shipyard in the third quarter of 2010, the drilling contractor said in a statement.
The new rig will be capable of drilling in water depths of up to 12,000 feet, with a total vertical drilling depth of up to 40,000 feet, Pride said. (Reporting by Jennifer Robin Raj in Bangalore)"
- - -
SDRLF got its ultra-deepwater rig delivered this year. Price tag $120 million (when it was ordered in 2004).
There's a screaming need for rigs.
RIG Fleet Contracts. Not bad outlook for offshore drillers. Long contracts with huge dayrates: Dec-07 to Jan-11 $520,000!! BP wants to find oil.
Hello Stuffit. Here's a link to a site (not free), which shows dividend paying stocks:
http://dividendinvestor.com/top100.php
Look e.g. at FRO's dividends 2002-2007
http://www.dividendinvestor.com/historical.php?no=50624
BQI. OPEC last week: “Regarding non-conventional oil supply and biofuels from non-OPEC countries, the most significant growth is expected to come from Canadian oilsands, which is seen rising in the reference case to five million bpd (barrels per day) in 2030 from just one million in 2005,“ said the World Oil Outlook 2007.
Good newspaper article about BQI/oilsands.
Thursday » July 5 » 2007
Oilpatch eyes neighbour
Bitumen find in Saskatchewan could spawn new industry
Claudia Cattaneo
Financial Post
Tuesday, April 17, 2007
By oil sands measures, the core sample plucked from 200 metres below a spindly Jack-pine forest last month was a beauty. Saturated with bitumen, the brownish, one-metre cut, part of a 20-metre oil sands zone, smelled like fresh asphalt. The sand was as warm and homogenous as that of a Caribbean beach.
But it was not from Alberta. The core was unearthed in northwest Saskatchewan. In fact, it was one of 174 brought to light over the past two winters by drilling crews working for Oil sands Quest Inc., a junior oil sands company that is well on its way to demonstrating that a rich sliver of the Athabasca basin, centred in the Fort McMurray area of northeast Alberta, spills over into this neighbouring province.
If its aggressive exploration program shows there's enough of the stuff to support a commercial project, Saskatchewan could be producing oil from its first multi-billion-dollar in-situ oil sands project by the middle of the next decade.
"What we see in the reservoir is uncharacteristically good," Christopher Hopkins, CEO of the startup, said during a recent tour of his company's vast leases. "It's basically as good as it gets. "Saskatchewan has been fortunate enough to have a clear glimpse of the opportunity the energy industry offers [in Alberta]. We hope we can deliver an oil sands industry to them here."
If there is one to be had, a Saskatchewan oil sands industry would ramp up about half a century behind Alberta's. But it would also do it at faster speed, benefiting from Alberta's experience and a more receptive environment -- labour here is abundant, costs are lower, the fiscal terms more competitive.
A project would elevate Oil sands Quest to the big leagues. The company is among an aggressive, new generation of oil sands startups trying to beat the challenges faced by bigger companies -- such as high costs and labour shortages -- by using new technologies, looking in new areas, watching their pennies and even embracing higher environmental standards as a way to impress investors.
Mr. Hopkins and his team of oil sands explorers first became confident that the Athabasca deposits don't stop at the provincial boundary in early January, 2006, when their first well encountered oil bearing sands near Axe Lake, about 100 kilometres northeast of Fort McMurray on the Saskatchewan side of the border.
Oil sands Quest took on the prospect for two main reasons: It was away from the highly competitive environment on the Alberta side, and there had been evidence of rich bitumen deposits, some of which could be seen lining the banks of the nearby Clearwater River.
Still, skepticism was huge; to the point even the government of Premier Lorne Calvert didn't have rules in place to deal with such an industry.
"As recently as months ago, the Saskatchewan government was saying, 'Of course we know that there is oil sands here, but it will be too shallow and too deep to mine, too thin, too this and too that'," Mr. Hopkins said.
The oil community was similarly skeptical. At a recent fundraising dinner in Calgary with a big turnout from the oil patch, the leader of the Saskatchewan Party, Brad Wall, dramatically held up a scoop of one of Oil quest?s core samples to show the deposits indeed exist in his province. "There was always the question: 'Is it really there or not? Its 2007, and so how come nobody has looked in Saskatchewan? Why didn't any of the big companies come across here yet'," said Errin Kimball, vice-president exploration at Oil sands Quest.
Mr. Kimball's exploration team was convinced the main reason the Saskatchewan oil sands hadn't been discovered was that no one had seriously looked for them.
Industry was too busy developing the deposits on the Alberta side and ignoring left-wing Saskatchewan, until recently perceived as unfriendly to oil companies.
In fact, the province, Canada's second largest oil producer, has been revamping its oil and gas regime to promote investment and now has even more favourable terms than Alberta's. Mr. Hopkins said the province has been very supportive of his company's efforts.
The Axe Lake discovery well was drilled not far from where two oil majors, Shell Canada Ltd., a subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell PLC, and Gulf Canada Ltd., now a part of ConocoPhillips, found bitumen in 1974 -- and then moved on. In those days, bitumen oil sands were hardly stuff to get excited about.
Now, finding it was a big deal for Oil sands Quest. Reaction in the company's offices in Calgary and its camps in the frigid Saskatchewan wilderness ranged from elation to pride that the discovery was made in the province, in a brand new area, and that the task ahead involved not only building a company, but an industry.
"Our first hole exceeded our expectations, and it was a clearly a discovery hole," Mr. Hopkins said. "Our thinking was validated. We just continued to drill and continued to demonstrate through the drill bit that the oil is here."
The Company?s stock, heavily traded on the American Stock Exchange, shot up above US$8 last year. It has since retreated to less than US$3.50 (it closed yesterday at US$3.28, down US14?) on uncertainty about new greenhouse gas regulations, lower oil prices and tax and royalty changes. Oil sands Quest plans to list on the Toronto Stock Exchange this year.
Last year, the company kicked off one of the largest oil sands drilling programs in Western Canada. Last month, eight drilling rigs were working its leases.
It was no routine undertaking. The Axe Lake project is located about 100 kilometres northeast of Fort McMurray --close enough to see the thick columns of smoke billowing from the major oil sands projects, but so isolated it's hard to reach by motor vehicle or airplane.
The Company flies people in and out on a bush plane that lands on a frozen lake as it waits for a permit to build a permanent airstrip.
Its leases are so vast they required building and maintaining 350-kilometres of ice roads and three camps. Employees -- there are 200 on site -- travel with cigarette lighters even if they don't smoke, just in case they get lost and need to start a fire. They're expected to check in and out as they move around the project. If they don't show up when expected, a search party is mobilized. Six ambulances are always on stand-by.
Mr. Hopkins estimates running the operation costs about $150,000 to $200,000 a day.
But the area's isolation is also its advantage. The natural barriers that keep people from coming in are also keeping them from going away to lucrative jobs in Fort McMurray, leaving more available for Oil sands Quest to hire from nearby Metis and First Nations communities like La Loche.
"We are not faced with nearly the competition that you see in McMurray," said site supervisor Morris Kimball. "We are finding qualified people."
The Company buys services, food and equipment in Saskatchewan to support the local economy, while at the same time benefiting from its lower costs.
So far, the drilling program has been encouraging. At the end of last year, the company reported it found 500 million barrels of resource after drilling 24 wells into 20-metres thick geological structure stretching about 60 square kilometres. Following a 150-well drilling program this winter, that estimate was boosted to 1.5-billion barrels.
Simon Raven, chief geologist of Oil sands Quest, said the sands found so far are of excellent quality.
"The saturation of this core is excellent," he said as he inspected a specimen, laid out in a core shack near a drilling rig noisily penetrating the ground. "I suggest that the saturation is about 14% by weight. Generally, in Alberta, they are running at about 12%.
"It's all sand, no clay or shale material
in here," he said. "The sand is all the same size. It's sorted into very consistent grain size, which gives you a lot of porosity and permeability. Generally, those are the attributes we seek."
More drilling is expected this summer and next winter as the company looks for the boundaries of the deposits.
Meanwhile, Oil sands Quest has been working with the Saskatchewan government to nail down fiscal terms.
A year ago, the province announced an oil sands royalty regime that involves a 1% royalty until the project has recovered its costs, and 20% after. That's more favourable than in Alberta, where the government collects 1% through payout, then 25% and is currently holding a review to determine whether royalties should be increased.
What's still missing in Saskatchewan is a regulatory framework. Those rules are expected to be finalized shortly.
"They won't simply Xerox the Alberta regulations. I don't blame them," Mr. Hopkins said. "But because they have to develop them, it takes time."
As the rules become clearer, other oil sands explorers are expected to move into Saskatchewan.
Eventually, Oil sands Quest wants to line up a partner to help out with building a project and share costs, expected to range between $5-billion and $10- billion.
It's also pondering upgrading options in Saskatchewan, where there are upgrades in Lloydminster and Regina.
"We are knocking down the barriers one at a time," Mr. Hopkins said. "The first one was: there is no oil. That one is done. Secondly, it's to demonstrate that there are sufficient barrels here. We hope to demonstrate that with this program. And then, commerciality."
ccattaneo@nationalpost.com
OK thanks. Sounds good. Waiting for news next week.
GM Stuffit. Please tell me how is BQI doing today (I have problems with my Mac/browser). Up/down? Any volume?
I'm hoping for a Friday dip.
FYI Remember new SEC regulations for shortselling become valid today: no uptick needed any more for selling short:
http://www.sec.gov/news/digest/2007/dig062807.txt