Proactiveinvestors recommends
Pdf

COMPANY SNAPSHOT: Rio Tinto, Xstrata, Range Resources, Chariot Oil & Gas, GGG Resources

8th Aug 2011, 8:06 am by Sergei Balashov COMPANY SNAPSHOT: Rio Tinto, Xstrata, Range Resources, Chariot Oil & Gas, GGG Resources

Investors were focused on the mining sector this morning after several companies including a few blue chips updated the markets on their operations.

Among them was Vedanta Resources (LON:VED), which has acquired a 51 percent stake in Western Cluster Limited (WCL) of Liberia for US$90 million in cash via its subsidiary Sesa Goa Limited.

WCL will develop the Western Cluster Iron ore project in Liberia which includes development of iron ore deposits, necessary transportation and shipping infrastructure for export of iron ore.

Vedanta said that the acquisition will make Sesa Goa a “significant player in the upcoming West African iron ore hub”.

Fellow mining major Xstrata (LON:XTA) this morning confirmed that First Coal Corporation (FFC) is now wholly owned subsidiary of Xstrata Coal Canada, following successful completion of the plan of arrangement on 4 August.
The purchase of First Coal, for an all-cash consideration of C$147million, has given Xstrata access to coking coal exploration leases in British Columbia.

Sector peer Rio Tinto (LON:RIO) said that it and Mitsubishi have made a proposal to acquire the rest of the shares in Coal and Allied for a total A$123.2 per share in cash.

Rio Tinto, through a wholly-owned subsidiary, is Coal and Allied's largest shareholder, currently holding 75.71 per cent of Coal & Allied shares. Mitsubishi Development currently holds 10.20 per cent of Coal and Allied shares.

Moving to small cap miners, GGG Resources (LON:GGG) told investors this morning that following a review of the new drill data from the Bullabulling gold project in Australia has increased the drill density required to classify the resource estimate into the Indicated category.

This will reduce both the timeline and cost to complete the current infill drilling programme along the Bullabulling trend.

In oil and gas, Chariot Oil & Gas (LON:CHAR) announced two farm-out agreements this morning.

Seismic company PGS has agreed to acquire 10 percent in Chariot's Central Blocks (Licence 19, covering Blocks 2312 A & B and Northern halves of 2412 A & B), offshore Namibia in return for funding 50 percent of the planned 3D seismic programme.

In a separate deal, BP (LON:BP.) has bought a 50 percent share of Chariot's equity interest in Southern Block 2714A (Licence 20).

Under the terms of the agreement, BP will cover Chariot's cost of drilling the first exploration well, as well as past costs incurred.

Another small cap oil and gas company Range Resources (LON:RRL) announced that in the two months since completing its Trinidad acquisition, the company has successfully drilled its first development well on the Morne Diablo block.

Log data from the well has indicated around 145 feet of net oil pay in the shallow Forest Formation, an established producing horizon on the block.

“The successful drilling of the MD 247 well indicates that Range's aggressive program to increase production and cash flow in Trinidad is on track and the first pay zone size has exceeded expectations,” said executive director of Range Resources Peter Landau.

Elsewhere in the sector, Gulfsands Petroleum (LON:GPX) reported today that the Khurbet East 19H well in Syria has achieved a flow rate of 5,516 barrels of oil per day on production test.

The 67 metre horizontal productive section of this well is located in a sidetrack drilled in a south-southeasterly direction from the original KHE-19 vertical hole.

The rate was the highest yet measured from any well on the Khurbet East field.

Gulfsands added that the well has demonstrated that excellent reservoir quality exists from the central portion of the field all the way to the northern limit of the field.

Moving away from resource stocks, safety and personal security accessories specialist Ila Group (LON:ILA) has received significant orders from a major new multi-national client totalling over US$800,000.

Further orders are expected over the next three months from this blue-chip customer, said Ila.

The group has also raised £1.55 million via a share placing at a price of 1.2 pence per share.

Elsewhere in the markets, mobile push email and synchronization services company Synchronica (LON:SYNC) has launched a Synchronica Mobile Gateway Instant Messaging (IM) client app for the Android mobile operating system.

The application enables operator-branded IM services on Android Smartphones.

América Móvil will be the first to launch the new client app, which is powered by Synchronica's IMPS platform through all their subsidiaries.

In other news, Seeing Machines (LON:SEE) has secured a new contract for Driver State System (DSS) with Toll Mining Services in Australia.

The vision based technology group will now implement its DSS across Toll’s road-going mining trucks at the CapCoal German Creek mine in the Bowen Basin, Queensland.

This is the first deployment for the Toll Group.

No investment advice

The Company is a publisher and is not registered with or authorised by the Financial Services Authority (FSA). You understand and agree that no content published on the Site constitutes a recommendation that any particular security, portfolio of securities, transaction, or investment strategy is suitable or advisable for any specific person. You further understand that none of the information providers or their affiliates will advise you personally concerning the nature, potential, advisability, value or suitability of any particular security, portfolio of securities, transaction, investment strategy, or other matter.

You understand that the Site may contain opinions from time to time with regard to securities mentioned in other products, including company related products, and that those opinions may be different from those obtained by using another product related to the Company. You understand and agree that contributors may write about securities in which they or their firms have a position, and that they may trade such securities for their own account. In cases where the position is held at the time of publication and such position is known to the Company, appropriate disclosure is made. However, you understand and agree that at the time of any transaction that you make, one or more contributors may have a position in the securities written about. You understand that price and other data is supplied by sources believed to be reliable, that the calculations herein are made using such data, and that neither such data nor such calculations are guaranteed by these sources, the Company, the information providers or any other person or entity, and may not be complete or accurate.

From time to time, reference may be made in our marketing materials to prior articles and opinions we have published. These references may be selective, may reference only a portion of an article or recommendation, and are likely not to be current. As markets change continuously, previously published information and data may not be current and should not be relied upon.