So Petrobras, Statoil and Cairn Energy tipped as potentials...
Done Petro and statoil to death. Only issues with those are independence - I argue that Petro is independent but that is neither here nor there.
Had a look at Cairn (sorry if this has already been done - too many posts on MEO wall).
Independence - tick
Major - you'd have to cast the net pretty wide to say that
Reputation - I hadn't even heard of them until this morning... not that would be relevant to MEO I suppose :).
First Aussie entry - I thought tick but Wikipedia informs that they expanded to Australia. Then again wiki made me make a fool of myself on HC last week so I dont know what to believe. FWIW, map of operations shows nothing in OZ but google search discovers they bought an Aussie company previously and there was a company registered called Cairn Energy Australia so dont think it would be a first Aussie entry which would rule them out (please let that be right!)
Edinburgh-based with market cap of 5 billion pounds. Revenue of US$300 million in 2008. Have fluctuated between FTSE 100 and FTSE250 over past few years. "Tremendous brand name"?????
If that's a tremendous brand name then I think im going to be a little disappointed. Statoil or my fave petro would clearly be preferable from SP point of view.
MEO Price at posting:
45.5¢ Sentiment: LT Buy Disclosure: Held
