Thanks for the feedback and the links nymph,Yes a "binding"...

Thanks for the feedback and the links nymph,
Yes a "binding" agreement. Indeed a vote of confidence.
Can MBT deliver?
I think so!

I have held MBT for a while now and it's very satisfying to see it finally start the recovery from the deep lows of the past year.

The Jathropa story is quite an interesting one though.
That industry has had it's share of hope, hype, problems and finally success.

It's not quite the miracle crop that everyone touted initially, ie,
Massive yields in a couple of years, can be grown in arid drought ravaged areas with very poor soils with little effort and therefore in no way competes with food crops.
That was a bit much to expect, but many a dollar was lost by many a venture in trying to make it happen just like that.

The truth of the matter is of course more down to earth.
Jathropa can be grown in marginal soils, but it does need good management and it does need water to produce any sort of reasonable yields.

I believe Mission has the expertise and more importantly it has the infrastructure in place to mange their plantations successfully.

Their plantations across much of India are also sufficiently mature now to enable the transition of their refinery from palm oil feed to Jathropa feed to start slowly ramping up as we speak.

Also the refining capacity of 350 K tonnes which will be on line at the start of 2010, will eventually be matched by the feed from current plantations of 350,000 acres of Jathropa .
When the trees are fully mature, seed cake will effectively pay for the cultivation and the oil will be nearly free to MBT.

MBT’s investor presentation of Sep' this year at the Rodman & Renshaw Global Investment Conference gives a good wrap of the current state of the company for those who have not yet seen it.

http://www.missionnewenergy.com/uploads/761406.pdf

It’s pretty clear that I hold a favorable and obviously biased view of this company, but that’s because the research I have done leads me to believe that MBT is one of the best prospects in this field.
It’s also clear that Valero now believe the same.

Good luck to all holders, although luck probably wont have much to do with what happens from here on.

To those who don’t have a holding, I suggest you do some research of your own and make a fairly quick decision one way or another.

Cheers