buy buy buy!!!

Mission accomplished, buy Jupiter

Steve Rotherham
Friday, May 05, 2006

NEW biodiesel player, Mission Biofuels, ended its first day on the Australian Stock Exchange at a 38.5% premium to its issue price.



Biodiesel can be produced from palm oil. Image courtesy of Mission Biofuels

Mission started trading on the ASX yesterday, two weeks earlier than planned following a significantly oversubscribed initial public offering. Its market capitalisation on listing was about $A91 million.

MBT closed at $1.38.5 yesterday, then opened higher at $1.45 this morning.

With corporate operations based in Perth, Mission Biofuels will construct a 100,000 tonne per annum biodiesel plant at the port of Kuantan in Malaysia using crude palm oil as its primary feedstock. Biodiesel is suitable for use in most diesel engines and is marketed as a clean alternative to petrodiesel.

Mission has a five-year supply contract for palm oil and has already signed a five-year off-take agreement for the sale of all its biodiesel production into the German market with Austrian-based fuel trader Godiver.

The company has a Perth office but is Malaysian-owned. Managing director Swaminathan Mahalingam told Malaysian newspaper Business Times that the Australian investment community had a better understanding of biofuels than its Malaysian counterpart.

While the country's business community may not understand biofuels, the Malaysian Government provides a five-year tax holiday for biodiesel start-ups.

Based on the plant's 100,000tpa capacity, Mission Biofuels has forecast to generate $74.3 million in revenue in fiscal 2008, delivering net profit of $27.7 million.

Another company associated with biodiesel from palm oil was also a big mover on the ASX this week. Bab & Brown Environmental Investments owns 50% of Natural Fuels Australia, which is building a Darwin biorefinery. BEI closed at $3.16 yesterday, up 25.4% for the week and 38% for the month.

Meanwhile, ASX-listed minnow Jupiter Energy is also moving to get into palm oil-derived biodiesel sector by setting up a Malaysia-based operation using local palm oil as feedstock.

Until mid-2005, Jupiter Energy was called Westcoast. In June last year, it changed its name and focus to become an energy company. Its Victorian oil and gas operations, undertaken in partnership with Lakes Oil, have been unsuccessful so far.

But flagging a move into biofuels seems to have done the trick. JPR closed at 14.5c yesterday, up 7.4% for the week and 61.3% for the month. Perhaps investors who believe Mission is too pricey see Jupiter as an inexpensive speculative buy.