Around the Traps ... with THE FERRET 08:23, Tuesday, 19 September 2006
Sydney - Tuesday - Sep 19: (RWE Australian Business News) - **************************
If it's buy straw hats in winter then why not buy wine stocks in a grape glut?
This could be happening in McGUIGAN SIMEON WINES (MGW).
The shares were $4.10 this time a year ago and slid relentlessly to plumb a low of $1.905 on August 28.
However, the stock has really shaken off the shackles in the past two sessions.
It rose 19c to $2.17 on Friday (in heavy trading) and a further 8c to $2.25 yesterday before closing at $2.22.
Neil on the email says it is interesting to note that the substantial shareholders have been consistently buying shares this year and now account for just on 50 per cent of capital, well up from a year ago.
Sure enough, when we checked we found a string of recent increased shareholding announcements including Brandes with 11.4 per cent of capital, State Teachers of Ohio 5.04 per cent, FMR Corp 9.2 per cent, Maple Brown 9.5 per cent and Morgan Stanley 5.06 per cent.
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Remember the other day when we said the moral of the story was that if you saw a Namibian uranium stock ... stick to it.
Well, forget about it.
LOUISIANA PETROLEUM (LOU) became a Namibian uranium stock yesterday and promptly fell 7c to 26c before closing at 29.5c.
Louisiana has entered into an agreement, subject to completion of due diligence and shareholder approval, to acquire majority interests in mineral projects in mid-central Namibia, southern Africa.
The projects cover an area of 920 sq kms and are prospective for uranium.
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No, wait ...
That Namibia rule still holds.
The stock which sparked the idea, BANNERMAN RESOURCES (BMN), has taken off again.
It was at 91c when we most recently spotted it (it was for the fourth time!), and up from 66c four days earlier.
But the price fell back to as low as 72.5c last Tuesday before rebounding.
Yesterday trading opened at $1.025 and finished at $1.21, up 19c on the day.
The company is exploring in a region which hosts the world's largest open-cut uranium mine at Rossing (majority owned by RIO TINTO) and PALADIN's (PDN) Langer Heinrich deposit.
Bannerman had a 3-for-1 split a month ago, which means the shares have risen more than 10-fold from the 34c they were fetching a year ago.
It's another Paladin.
Bannerman's last report on September 6 said results had exceeded its expectations, increasing the number of anomalies within the licence from 13 to 18.
Given the latest scramble, even more anomalies must have popped up.
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The headline from SAI GLOBAL (SAI) said: "Makes its Marque with Italian Acquisition".
It should have stopped there but, no, it came back for more with this in the body of the announcement: "The acquisition really puts SAI in pole position to drive its business improvement solutions across Europe."
Marque? Pole?
SAI was announcing the purchase of CerTo in Italy which "dominates Italy's AUTOMOTIVE certification industry".
Get it?
Unfortunately the shares stalled on the news and lost 5c to $3.35.
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It wasn't all that long ago kindies was the new boom.
Now it's aged care.
HARVEST LIVING (HLE) yesterday settled the acquisition of the 3000 square metre site next to the Bridgewater Aged Care Facility in Victoria for a 60-bed extension to Bridgewater, making 192 in all.
Harvest is considering other potential development sites for aged care facilities and hopes to make a further announcement soon.
The company has been suspended from share trading since June 9 following the takeover of Bridgewater.
It could do with a name change when it comes back.
(Comments and complaints to [email protected] - no requests for advice please.)
(20min delay)