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Media Digest 11/2/2009 Reuters, WSJ, NYTimes, FT, Bloomberg

247wallst — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 08:54:40 +0000

Reuters: Investors in the banking sector were disturbed by the CIT (NYSE:CIT) bankruptcy.

Reuters: Summers will lead a high level meeting on the economy.

Reuters: US companies are holding more cash.

Reuters: The Fed is likely to keep interest rates flat due to economic uncertainty.

Reuters: Comcast (NASDAQ:CMCSA) is close to gaining control of NBC Universal from GE (NYSE:GE).

Reuters: Bank of American (NYSE:BAC) is trying to get the head of BNY Mellon (NYSE:BK) to take CEO job.

Reuters: Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) is close to buying Fannie Mae (NYSE:FNM) tax credits.

Reuters: Wal-Mart (NYSE:WMT) announced a second round of toy cost cuts.

Reuters: October retail sales could be a disappointment.

WSJ: The US and GMAC are fighting about capital levels at the lending company.

WSJ: The head of BNY Mellon told Bank of America that he is not interested in the CEO job.

WSJ: Danbury Resources (NYSE:DNR) will buy Encore Acquisition (NYSE:EAC) for $3.25 billion .

WSJ: The Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) iPhone got a luke warm reception in China.

WSJ: Editorial content at The Detroit Free Press is being influenced by advertisers.

WSJ: EBay (NASDAQ:EBAY) will begin an ad campaign.

WSJ: Companies hold more assets in cash that at any time in four decades.

WSJ: The Fed is looking at raising interest rates.

WSJ: More college presidents are earning over $1 million a year.

WSJ: The Institute for Supply Management numbers for last month should be up a bit.

WSJ: Blackstone (NYSE:BX) will broaden its business in China.

WSJ: Investors in banks should look at loss buffers.

WSJ: Ford (NYSE:F) may change the locations of where it builds some cars after losing a UAW vote.

NYT: Human Genome Sciences (NASDAQ:HGSI) has a promising lupus drug.

FT: The US Senate will introduce a draft financial bill.

FT: Wal-Mart (NYSE:WMT) is looking at urban expansion in the US.

FT: Pfizer (NYSE:PFE) says it back US health reform.

Bloomberg: Citigroup (NYSE:C) and JP Morgan (NYSE:JPM) are hoarding cash as if another crisis is coming which will hurt returns.

Douglas A. McIntyre

Posted in Press Digest Tagged: AAPL, BAC, BK, BX, C, CIT, CMCSA, DNR, EAC, EBAY, F, FNM, GE, GS, HGSI, JPM, PFE, WMT

Denbury Resources Hits the Big Time (DNR, ROH, DOW)

247wallst — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 12:48:24 +0000

Oil and gas E&P company Denbury Resources Inc. (NYSE:DNR) will be added to the S&P 500 after trading closes on April 1st. Denbury replaces Rohm and Haas Co. (NYSE:ROH), which Standard & Poor’s expects to be purchased by Dow Chemical Corp. (NYSE:DOW).

Like most E&P companies, Denbury had a big first half of 2008, but earnings sank in the second half on falling crude prices. EPS for the full 2008 fiscal year was $1.59; for the fourth quarter EPS totaled just $0.18, barely 11% of the total.

Denbury has operations in the Barnett Shale play in Texas, and tertiary recovery fields in Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi. The company also owns a large carbon dioxide deposit in Mississippi. The CO2 is used in a technique called CO2 flooding to cover more barrels from existing fields. Denbury is also building a new CO2 pipeline, which the company hopes to use to pipe carbon dioxide from power plant emissions to fields for enhanced oil recovery.

Denbury shares are up nearly 8% this morning. The company’s 52-week range is $5.59-$40.32, and its market cap as of yesterday was $4.03 billion.

Paul Ausick
March 26, 2009

Posted in Index, Oil & Gas Tagged: DNR, DOW, ROH

Oil & Energy Upgrades & Downgrades (APA, DNR, E, XOM, OXY, PXP, RDS.A, SPWRA)

247wallst — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 12:20:11 +0000

These are the top analyst calls we have seen in the oil patch and in the energy sector this Monday morning:

Apache (NYSE: APA) Raised to Outperform at Credit Suisse.
Denbury Resources Inc. (NYSE: DNR) Cut to Neutral at Credit Suisse.
ENI S.p.A. (NYSE: E) Raised to Overweight at JPMorgan.
Exxon Mobil (NYSE: XOM) Started as Buy at Citigroup.
Occidental Petroleum (NYSE: OXY) Cut to Neutral at Credit Suisse.
Plains Exploration (NYSE: PXP) Cut to Neutral at Credit Suisse.
Royal Dutch Shell (NYSE: RDS.A) Cut to Market Perform at Sanford Bernstein.
SunPower (NASDAQ: SPWRA) Cut to Underweight at Morgan Stanley.

JON C. OGG

Posted in Alternative Energy, Analyst Calls, Oil & Gas Tagged: APA, DNR, E, OXY, PXP, RDS.A, SPWRA, XOM

Tale of Two Small-Cap Oil Companies (VQ, DNR, CRED)

247wallst — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 11:13:33 +0000

Venoco, Incorporated (NYSE:VQ) announced this morning that it will cut its capital spending in 2009 to $150 million. As recently as last November, Venoco had planned to spend $400 million on capex in 2009.

Last July, the company withdrew a planned IPO that would haveestablished an E&P master limited partnership. Venoco is alsotrying to complete the sale of about 18.4 million barrels of oilequivalent to Denbury Resources, Inc. (NYSE:DNR). Venoco expects torealize $150 million from the sale, which the company plans to use toreduce outstanding debt.

In other energy news, CREDO Petroleum Corporation (NASDAQ:CRED) issueda pat-itself-on-the-back press release this morning. The Denver Posthas named CREDO as the top performing energy stock in Colorado for 2008.

Let’s see, CREDO stock closed at $9.87/share on January 2, 2008, and at$8.42/share on December 31, 2008. That’s a drop of about 15%. Thingsmust be tougher than we thought in Colorado.

Paul Ausick
January 12, 2009

Posted in Oil & Gas Tagged: CRED, DNR, VQ

Margin Calls Hit Execs Left & Right (AIV, BSX, CPE, CHK, DNR, LTM, PROV, PHM, SPA, STRL, WSM)

247wallst — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 20:06:55 +0000

There are many C-Suite executive from Wall Street to main Street that didn’t exactly get their stock priorities right. Many company executives are getting margin calls and are being forced to liquidate their stocks. Some are for stocks in their own company, some are for stocks and general, and some are just forced to sell to meet margin calls for entirely different reasons unrelated to their companies. below is a partial list of margin call victims from this week:

Apartment Investment and Management Co. (NYSE: AIV) Executive VicePresident David Robertson sold another 14,800 company shares early thisweek after the company stock had dropped some 7).

Boston Scientific Corp. (NYSE: BSX) co-founder and Chairman Peter M.Nicholas was forced to sell over $29 million worth of BSX shares, butdon’t feel too bad for him. He’s got plenty more.

Callon Petroleum Inc. (NYSE: CPE) chairman and CEO Fred Callon unloaded110,000 company shares at an average price of $7.84 to meet margincalls.

Chesapeake Energy Corp. (NYSE: CHK) CEO Aubrey McLendon has alreadybeen wiped out of essentially all of his shares worth more than 41billion back at the peak. The sad part is his forced selling may havebeen right at the lows.

Denbury Resources Inc. (NYSE: DNR) CEO Garteth Roberts had 513,000shares sold in involuntary margin calls. Interestingly enough, thiswas to meet a real estate loan rather than any stock event.

Life Time Fitness Inc (NYSE: LTM) Chairman & CEO Bahram Akradi wasforced to sell roughly $5.6 million in involunarty stock sales sales tocover margin calls.

Provident Financial Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ: PROV) senior VP Richard Galesold 5,000 shares of company stock at an average of $5.76 to meet amargin call. CEO & President Craig Blunden disclosed early thisweek that he had to unload 11,929 shares of stock the prior week tomeet margin calls.

Pulte Homes Inc. (NYSE: PHM) chairman and founder William J. Pulte soldsome 760,000 Pulte shares to meet margin calls. These were apparentlyrelated to loan agreements that involved family members
and a charitable organization. And who said charity was so great….

Sparton Corp. (NYSE: SPA) Chairman Bradley Smith dumped 12,000 sharesof company stock to meet a margin call. This sale only netted about$22,000.00, but he has had to unload over $500,000.00 so far.

Sterling Construction Co. (NASDAQ: STRL) Chief Executive PatrickManning sold an additional 3,594 shares over margin calls, and it lookslike this brings his tally to more than $750,000.00 in margin callsales. A builder, in Houston….

Williams-Sonoma Inc. (NASDAQ: WSM) Chairman & CEO W.Howard Lester has now sold roughly 2.15 million shares to cover margincalls after a last filing this week showed that he sold 1.15 millionshares. Sadly enough, he nearly sold at the 52-week low.

Jon C. Ogg
October 31, 2008

Posted in Insider Activity Tagged: AIV, BSX, CHK, CPE, DNR, LTM, PHM, PROV, SPA, STRL, WSM

Another CEO Joins Margin Call Selling Mayhem (DNR, BSX, CHK, CBS, VIA, AIG)

247wallst — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 10:49:51 +0000

Gareth Roberts, CEO of Denbury Resources (NYSE:DNR) was forced to sell 513,000 shares of the company’s stock to meet a margin call "pursuant to a real estate based loan." That was about 15% of his holdings. This is not at all the first CEO in this boat, and it isn’t just smaller company CEO’s caught up in the margin call mayhem.

Earlier this month, Boston Scientific’s (NYSE:BSX) co-founders took a similar hit which was re-hit yesterday.
Aubrey McClendon of Chesapeake Energy (NYSE:CHK) was forced to sell nearly all his Chesapeake stock to meet margin calls on a loan.
Even Sumner Redstone has had to sell stakes from his National Amusement entity of stakes in CBS (NYSE: CBS) and Viacom (NYSE: VIA).
Even Hank Greenberg has not been immune to selling shares in American International Group (NYSE: AIG).

We have said before, and we’ll repeat it now, there will be more of this inthe future. This doesn’t just happen to leaders of small companies and it doesn’t just happen at troubled companies. This frequently happens to CEO’s holding stocks that fall in value which might not even be related to their own company. Now, we are seeing it tied to issues outside of stocks.

Ironically, Denbury is not suffering any hit to its shareprice this morning. The stock is up more than 11% as many investors arestarting to treat news of forced insider selling to meet margin calls as the final pukingphase of a drunk party.

Paul Ausick
October 30, 2008

Posted in Insider Activity Tagged: AIG, BSX, CBS, CHK, DNR, VIA