Financial markets have an impressive ability to discount (or predict) major events days in advance. For example, think of the market declines leading up to 9/11--the S&P 500 declined 7.79% over the ten trading days prior.  NOW, over the past five trading days, the S&P 500 has declined 12%, as...
Dan Loeb's Bearish View on Frac Sand Stocks Earlier this week, I showed you how the share prices of frac sand suppliers have crashed since February and have generated a lot of pain for shareholders. Here is the not so pretty picture: Ticker Company 2017 Share Price Peak Current Share Price Decline % Decline SLCA U.S. Silica $61.49 $37.39 $24.10 39% EMES Emerge Energy $24.45 $11.19 $13.26 54% HCLP Hi-Crush $23.30 $13.37 $9.93 43% FMSA Fairmount Santrol $13.12 $5.00 $8.12 62% Shareholders...
Investors have made HUGE capital gains in the last decade in energy metals—think uranium in 2007-2008, lithium in 2011 and lithium again in 2016. In 2007 I owned a large position in a junior uranium stock that went from 25 cents to $2.50.  Last year I owned a lithium stock...
By Bill Powers "Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Albert Einstein Therefore, energy investors in North America are insane. Cheap money (low interest rates) and high oil prices encouraged the drilling of many marginal plays from 2010-2014--causing a huge amount of energy bankruptcies after...
Sometimes finding the next big opportunity requires nothing more than common sense. By 2018 frac sand demand in the United States will have tripled from 2016. Common sense is all you need to know that this will be very good for frac sand stocks. That is simple economics. It really is very simple. As...
What’s the most un-sustainable part of the global energy complex? Maybe you would say co-ordinated OPEC production cuts. Or perhaps you would bring up high growth rates of shale producers. If you talked about the lack of free cash flow among shale producers you would be getting warm… But for me, when I...
Half the oil price but 4x the free cash flow! Sounds like a pitch from Barnum & Bailey's circus, doesn't it--Step right up folks and see it with  your own eyes! I'm going to show this magic trick--starting with the chart below.  In 2017 at $50 oil, Vermilion Energy (VET-TSX/NYSE)...
Shell has a 7 percent plus dividend yield and believes it can generate three times as much free cash flow at $60 oil going forward than it did at $90 oil from 2013 through 2015. If true, that has the makings of a company that you want to own. Those are...