this company any good?, page-16

jake002,

I was told by a CEO of a C/B coy 12mths ago, that even Santos at Fairview just had to try all sorts of different techniques, until they struck the right drilling and completion technique.

I don't think Santos have struck the right technique even now. Fairview is a different story because they are drilling around the edges of a very, very high perm field. But if you look at what happened to Santos recently, they just took a big Resource writedown in Arcadia. They are also still WELL short of the Reserves they need for two trains despite having masses of acreage - which shows they haven't been able to get the tight stuff to work either.

the important take-away for me, is if you ask WCL board and mgt about the quality of the field, the response you will get like "there is nothing wrong with the field".

You would get that response no matter what was wrong with the field. :) The field can definitely produce, it's one of the oldest CSG fields in Qld. But we have seen that while Arrow, QGC etc could make money from Tipton etc, Meridian can't make any real money at sub-$4 gas prices. That's no great revelation - just look at the financials, as arpeggioC pointed out. The flow rates just aren't high enough.

Think of it this way - with Arrow, QGC, CH4, Sunshine, Pure etc all being bought out prior to 2009, do you honestly think WCL would still be here if Meridian was such a good asset?

am not sure what is meant about CSG market dead since 2009. if you mean dead as in t/o?

I mean if you invested in any of the CSG companies still standing today in 2009, you'd be sitting on a big loss in pretty much all of them. Minimal interest from M&A, investment etc, despite it being pretty obvious the LNG plants need extra gas. Why has nobody snapped up BUL, MEL, or COI? WCL is the only one that's getting interest and even then it's at prices that disappoint both holders and the board.

I think you say WCL has no money - they in fact have $26m at last Qtrly. this is sufficient to complete the current drilling program of I think 8 development wells.

That's "no money" in my book. They need $150M or so to fully develop the field and to upgrade it to 60TJ/day. They need a big investor, or a big loan.

That's why this GSA is so important. If they can get it then hopefully they can secure funding for a proper field development to get this up to 60TJ/day. And then they will be making some serious money.