The biggest investment I ever had before UMC was in Hardman Resources (HDR) HDR was an oiler but there are similarities between it and UMC. I bought into HDR at 20 cents or so because it had prospective ground. It drilled and found a substantial resource, Chinguetti, (UMC equivalent Railway) the share price then shot up to over $1 before settling to 50 cents. Similar to UMC. Further drilling then greatly expanded the resource and the price rose to $2.50 before settling to $1,20 to $1.50. Again similar to UMC.
Here is where the similarities really start; all the chatter was about how do we get the oil out of the ground and to market? How do we manage the capex and the opex. Perhaps a joint venture with Woodside, perhaps we will be taken over. Woodside or BHP? Maybe Shell. Everybody was saying that the starting point for a takeover price had to be the $2.50 which we had already reached in the past. (UMC would be the $2.80 starting point) On HC we were adding up how many shares we had between us and how as a bloc we could influence the result.
When the takeover came however , it came out of the blue from an English mob called Tullow who none of us had ever heard of. They bid $2.00 and got it. A lot of us felt cheated but there you have it. We never went back to the heights.
I have a real sense of deja-vu with the recent UMC threads.
Pagarsi
UMC Price at posting:
91.0¢ Sentiment: LT Buy Disclosure: Held
