Just passing through and thought I would add some more confusion to the already confused CVI threads. Yes, I'm bored too!!!!
Apologies if the following news article has already been posted, but the following excerpts from 'Flawed Vote Further Entrenches Angola's Ruling Party' partly explains the smoke and mirrors we have experienced in dealings by the company with its Angolan connections.
According to official provisional results, the ruling MPLA won 81.8% of votes and the main opposition UNITA party won 10.4% in Friday's balloting, giving the ruling party well over the two-thirds parliamentary majority required to change the constitution.
But according to a Western diplomat who declined to be named, there was never an expectation that the vote would be free and fair. The best that could be hoped for was that the country would take a peaceful step toward democracy.
Angola rivals Nigeria as Africa's biggest oil producer, and is ranked by the watchdog group Transparency International as equally corrupt.
With the full and unflinching support from the international community for anything this regime does, it can safely privatize the whole country without any fear of criticism. It will be a free ride in terms of awarding most of the prizes to the presidential family and government officials," he said.
Members of the president's family and top government officials have shares in the country's top oil, diamond, banking and telecommunications firms. No foreign company can do business in Angola unless it teams up with an influential local company.
The country's economic growth reached 24% last year largely because of high oil prices. Its oil exports in 2007 earned about $43 billion.
The West has completely colluded in this [election result], not just because of oil but because Angola is a sort of a cafeteria for Western companies to do business without ethics," said Marques, in a reference to the country's high levels of corruption. "It's in the interests of the Western oil companies and many other business interests that Angola remains as it is."
Reading between the lines, the pathway is being cleared for TMT’s first prediction to come true as per the link below.
Except hopefully, we will have an increasing share price to accompany a substantially increased market cap.
Like it or lump it, CVI is what it is, and it happens to be dealing in Africa where business can be a little unorthodox as attempts are made to tap into resource riches to achieve much needed economic development after neglect due to decades of civil unrest.
While the CVI forum has been a share trader's dream in the past, in recent months it appears to be increasingly difficult to get a turn from a sensitively placed upramp or downramp – hence the vastly increased amount of noise we are experiencing, as traders try harder to impact sentiment.
Changed market conditions are basically responsible for the current poor trading conditions; a legacy of the sub prime chaos emanating out of the US, and which might be drawing to a conclusion with the collapse of Lehman's and the buy out of Merril Lynch.
While it is understandable that traders would want to create maximum turbulence by leveraging off all the unknowns associated with the CVI story – and there are plenty of anomalies and loose ends to choose from – the fact remains that their prolific posting regimes no longer create the price surges to support their trading positions.
The system is broken. The markets are struggling and the company has metamorphosed from a trading stock to a possible investment stock with a longer time horizon required to reap substantial rewards.
Then again, CVI may even prove to be dodgy as TMT has also suggested. The adventure in Angola might amount to zilch as the electoral fog slowly dissipates revealing the real players who have managed to gain favoured status with those who make the rules.
Fortunately for all who follow the story, the next 6 weeks (or thereabouts) should reveal one way or another, whether CVI and it shareholders are part of the team in Angola, or whether the Angolan commodities bull bucks off Smyth's CVI and nuzzles up to more favoured insiders as the gates to the commodities pastures are thrown open. But thrown open they will be, as the last remaining impediment for the finalisation of deals (ie. electoral success) has now been removed in a most convincing fashion as per the news article.
The best advice I can offer is if you don't like the story, simply step aside. There is no need for non holders to keep throwing up negativity, as everyone is aware of the ambiguities associated with CVI and of the futility of trying to get to the bottom of company dealings. Changed timeframes, changed strategic relationships, difficult to comprehend funding arrangements and a constant need for flexibility in developing Angolan partnerships can be forensically examined ad infinitum, and they have been - Without success. In any case it is the end destination that counts and there is still every reason to believe that the company will achieve its objectives. Those of us who continue to like the story and can stomach the risk if things go pear shaped, should simply tune out and check back in a couple of months.
IMHO, the constant gnashing of teeth and the mindless chatter that takes place on here is completely counter productive for both traders and investors and does the company a huge disservice.
It does however provide some entertainment as we work through sluggish market conditions waiting for deals to be consummated and for the commodities market to re-assert itself. Which it will, just don't ask me when, ......and hopefully when it does, CVI will be in a prime position to take full advantage of it......
Cheers nev
CVI Price at posting:
8.2¢ Sentiment: Hold Disclosure: Held
