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    Some interesting stuff on Charles Couch

    http://vcresearch.info/open/forums.asp?TopicId=7159&ForumId=77

    admin
    10/11/2006 1:11:03 PM Oil rush attracts small investors
    Tuesday, October 10, 2006
    By Steve Levine, The Wall Street Journal
    DALLAS -- In 1930, thousands of investors earned windfalls when a smooth-talking wildcat driller named Columbus "Dad" Joiner discovered the enormous East Texas oil field. Enticed by family lore, Mr. Joiner's great-granddaughter, Cindy Skeeters, recently invested about $80,000 in wildcat wells.
    Today, Mrs. Skeeters and husband Bill own production rights to small shares in some seven dozen oil and natural-gas wells in Texas, Louisiana and Oklahoma. They bought their stakes from Oil2 Holdings Inc., run by Charles Couch, 57 years old, and his son Robert, 33.
    Whether the Skeeters will profit is far from certain. Royalty checks have plunged along with oil and natural-gas prices since summer, and it could take six years just to recover their investment. Even if they do earn a real return, the amount could be much reduced by high expenses and by the steep production declines typical in the energy industry.
    Millions of Americans, Europeans, Australians and others are trying to get in on the current version of the 1930s oil boom, this one driven by high prices. Most invest in big companies like Exxon Mobil Corp. or energy-focused mutual funds. But others buy stakes in actual wells through much riskier partnerships. Regulators say fraud in such partnerships is rife. Some firms offer talk of certain production, but many investors have lost 90 percent or more of their money.
    Many partnerships don't register as brokers, even though regulators say they are selling securities and should be licensed and required to abide by securities laws. According to a Dallas federal civil court complaint filed in June, the Securities and Exchange Commission accused Larry Stiles of Carrollton, Texas, of spending a quarter of $1.1 million collected from 52 oil-well investors on personal expenses. Mr. Stiles's lawyer couldn't be reached.
    It's a global problem that's only now coming to the surface because of a lag time between the sale and when an investor "realizes he's got a problem," says Bill McDonald, a former California regulator who now testifies as an expert in oil-fraud cases.
    The Couches both are former football players, the father in a semi-pro league and the son in preseason stints with the Atlanta Falcons and St. Louis Rams.
    The senior Mr. Couch started their Dallas-based firm in the early 1990s after three decades of personally investing in wells. Then called Couch Oil & Gas, it found clients via sales seminars, telephone solicitations and word of mouth. It wasn't licensed as a securities broker and, the Couches now acknowledge, essentially skirted the law.
    Between 1999 and last year, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin regulators ordered the elder Mr. Couch and his firm to cease-and-desist selling shares in wells in those states without a license. In 2001, his son Robert joined the firm with an eye toward licensing the company.
    "It freaked me out," Robert Couch says. "I didn't want to do my career if we were breaking security laws."
    He persuaded his father to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on lawyer fees to register with the National Association of Securities Dealers as a broker-dealer. He then set up Oil2 Holdings to take over sales, leaving his father to find oil prospects.
    Robert Couch soon realized that many of the firm's investors were losing money, mainly because they had invested in a limited number of fields. A bet on only, say, two exploratory wells can be a big loser if both end up being dry holes. The Couches now counsel clients to put a little money in a lot of wells -- at least 20 a year -- and warn them that profit is not guaranteed.
    "What differentiates us from everyone else is the effort to be transparent, our integrity," says Robert Couch.
    Still, the senior Mr. Couch acknowledges that the lure of hitting a big strike hasn't changed since the 19th century. "They're going to exercise their riverboat gambler gene," he says.
    Others say such partnerships remain a questionable investment. Glen Jarboe is one such skeptic. A retired marketing professor at the University of Texas in Arlington, Mr. Jarboe compiled production statistics on the Couches' wells for their Web site until a few months ago and invested in their partnerships himself. Mr. Jarboe says the deck is stacked against people who buy into such deals.
    As is typical in the industry, Oil2 Holdings charges a fee of 30 percent for each dollar invested, reducing how much is spent on exploration and production. Companies actually drilling wells for Oil2's partnerships usually take 25 percent of each well's output -- also standard. Moreover, production in Texas natural-gas wells falls to about 15 percent of their original output on average after four years, says Gary Swindell, a Dallas-based energy expert. Oil depletion is more difficult to track.
    Robert Couch disagrees with Mr. Jarboe. He says tax benefits for oil investments juice returns. He adds that Mr. Jarboe himself has earned about $16,000 annually on his $100,000 investment, or about 16 percent a year for two years.
    Mr. Jarboe says oil field production is too erratic to judge returns based on early performance. "In six years, every well could be dry," he says. Though initially hopeful, he now doubts he'll earn money in the end.
    Mr. and Mrs. Skeeters decided to invest last November. Driving home from a 75th anniversary celebration of Mrs. Skeeters's great-grandfather's big find in Kilgore, east of Dallas, Mr. Skeeters said he wanted to start investing their own money in wells. "Don't lose it," Mrs. Skeeters recalls responding.
    A friend recommended the Couches, who sell mostly natural-gas wells. Following the firm's advice, the couple so far has paid about $30,000 for 20 exploratory oil and natural-gas wells, plus $50,000 for a package of 63 mostly active wells.
    They received their first royalties on the 63 wells in May -- $1,036.38. The four monthly checks since then have averaged about $660, as natural-gas prices plummeted. At that rate, it would take almost six years for the couple to earn back their $50,000.
    There's no way of knowing how much the Skeeters will make from the 20 exploratory wells. A look at the decline rates on their 63 wells -- published on Oil2's Web site -- shows why it could be hard to turn a profit. Some of the wells have been steady producers this year, and output from a few rose after upgrading. But production from most has dropped. One well declined to 103 barrels of oil and 19,940 thousand cubic feet of gas a day in August, from 203 barrels and 24,765 thousand cubic feet in January.
    Mr. Skeeters says he sees the wells as a 20-year investment and isn't put off by the results. "I don't look at it as sexy, romantic or exotic. I've covered most of the other bases" with other investments, he says. "These aren't home runs."

    admin
    10/11/2006 12:50:34 PM Despite the blog opinons of investors below that the return on Couch n/k/a Oil2 were 'low', I had to blink a couple of times reading the Wall Street Article. What I got out of the article is the wells drilled in that West Texas dropped 85% of their initial production by the fourth year. And that the payout to investors on the wells that came in (disregarding the statistical effect of any dry holes for a moment) was 16% a year.
    Okay, dropping 16% returns 85% means by the fifth year investor returns on successful wells leaves about a 2% return by the fifth year. So in the four years of useful production the returns would be 16%X4=64%. 2% more per year would mean an additional 18 years for investors to reach 100% returns. So the breakeven point would be 18+4=22 years.
    Why would anyone invest in wells that took 22 years to break even on a cash investment basis? Granted there are tax breaks, but investors can only write off intangible drilling costs, labor, etc, which may amount to 30% of the cost of the wells. If you invest $10,000 X 30% = $3,000. And if you are in a 30% tax bracket your actual write off would be about $1,000 on the $10,000 investment. Even doubling or tripling that write off hardly makes a 22 year break even palatable, in our opinion.
    More to the point, what operator would want to drill wells with such a poor payout?
    Which inevatably drives one to a suspicion that the reason for any operator drilling wells like these are; the operators are getting a bigger payout the investors, and/or any 'fees' taken the top from investors money.
    In order to counter this possiblity at VRI our investing requirements on oil and gas are:
    1) Written evidence that the company has actually made money for investors with
    a) A written track record of ALL wells drilled, by name so production can be checked.
    b) A written record of how much money investors put into each well.
    c) A written record of how much money investors have been paid out on each well.
    2) Direct pay financing. Investors put up the amount necessary to drill the well(s) into an account under their control. The oil company presents the billing costs to that account under a control of an fiduciary, like an accountant or attorney.
    3) Profits from the wells paid back into the investor account, with the fiduciary allotting those profits to the investors and oil company according to the prearranged profit splitting agreement.
    At VRI we view development projects, like oil and gas, as joint business efforts. And like any joint business effort, if it succeeds everyone makes money. But if it failes NO ONE makes money including the oil and gas company.
    The oil and gas industry is full of people 'making money by raising money' rather than succeeding in the oil and gas business. On behalf of all oil and gas investors, we at the VRI investment club say that we are tired of being 'other peoples money' canon fodder. To heck with that nonsense.
    Bernie Bicoy
    VRI Admin

    jules
    5/17/2006 8:01:30 PM Here's some interesting notes on Couch Oil and Gas. Charles Couch seems like a good christian man, but he does have a chip on his shoulder. He has too many SEC violations in Oil and Gas and cannot run the company. The company is run under Robert Couch, his brother with a clean record. Investments in the wells look legitimate. I've invested in a quite a few wells and about 60% are successful. With that said, the returns are very low, and I believe the topic of Couch having a "license to steal" comes in. Couch oil and Oil2 holdings are the same company. One is the broker dealer. Couch Oil is not even the exploration and production company, they are the middleman who goes out and looks for good wells that are to be drilled by other drilling companies. Hence you are paying for this service and the markups and take from the oil wells that are producing. Couch purchases a couple of units from these producers, then breaks them up for investors at a minimum of 2000/well so people can diversify and small investors can get in to oil and gas investment without puting up too much capital. I think it's a shame to have invested over 100,000 and only get a revenue check of a couple of hundred bucks a month. I'm still not sure about the company, but have thought to be quite comfortable investing in them if you can stomach their high fees.

    euro
    2/19/2006 8:56:22 PM On their website it shows that the have good wells. www.couchoil.com Here is a company that like them or not, have made money for their people.

    admin
    2/15/2006 6:56:57 PM Received an anonymous call. The caller alleged that Charles Couch used to own a chemical company and has a 30 second section on a tape called 'Dallas, Arsenic and Old Money'. In this section Mr. Couch is testifying at a murder trial. The attorney on the other side states plainly that if Mr. Couch had not lied in his testimony the other side would have won the case. You can order the tape at this link. http://store.aetv.com/html/search/index.jhtml?search=Dallas+Arsenic+and+old+money&itemType=All
    The caller also claims that Mr. Couch was an investor in oil and gas, and when he found out about how much money could be made promoting oil and gas investment, with the assistance of another 'broker', set up his own firm. There is no confirmation on that however.

    admin
    11/15/2005 10:24:46 AM Couch Oil & Gas, Dyno Energy, Inc., Charles O. Couch, and William M. Wilhelm, Dallas, TX. File No. S-04061(EX). Orders of Prohibition and Revocation were issued based on allegations of fraud in the offer and sale of unregistered securities by an unlicensed broker-dealer and agent. Order issued: March 18, 2005
    Click here... CEASE AND DESIST and scan down to March 18, 2005

    admin
    11/15/2005 9:55:02 AM There are two different Couch’s. Couch Energy is from Garland Texas, and Couch Oil and Gas is in Dallas. However having eliminated Couch Energy I can turned my full attention to Couch Oil and Gas. The following is what our original archive on the Company contained. We are modifying it to include the following analysis below.
    COUCH OIL AND GAS/AURORA ENERGY – June 01. Aurora Energy Ltd has purchased oil and gas leasehold needed to drill 15 wells in Beyer Antrim Shale Unit project in Alpena County, Michigan. Drilling began May 6, 2001. It is offering only 25% Working Interest to outside investors. (1% Working Interest in each well=$1,657.00 or 1% in all 15 wells=$24,855). So 1% investment will allow investors get 1/15 of 1% in cash flows from all 15 wells.
    Aurora Energy, Ltd: 3760 N US-31 South, PO Box 961, Traverse City, Michigan 49685
    Contact person: 231-941-0073 John V. Miller
    Couch Oil & Gas: 1919 Rhome St., Dallas, TX 75229
    Phone: 972-444-0014 Charles Couch-General Partner; Robert Couch-General Manager
    An investor who is invested with the principal of this project 'quite a while' and is apparently happy with the results. In order to confirm his feelings on Couch Oil and Gas we would initially need answers to the following...
    Questions:
    - The disclosure of the relationship of Aurora Energy Ltd to Couch Oil & Gas
    - Can either and/or both of these companies provide an oil and gas drilling track record?
    - The Executive Summary states: “We are offering only 25% Working Interest to outside investors. You have placed 6.25 % with other industry investors. It is our understanding you will offer a 5% working interest in each well $8,285 to Couch Oil Partners”. We need some clarify on the switch in the wording here from WE to YOU.
    - Is the 6.25% and 5% from the 25% Working Interest?....
    UPDATE: Two months and no response to enquiry letter
    Additional Notes: Although the Couch brothers have reportedly been in the busy for sometime, and we started collecting information on them in 2001, the Texas Charter Date for the origination of Couch Energy is Feb 5, 2004. We have no explanation for this.
    We also understand that Couch Energy is forming an NASD registered broker dealer to raise money for their drilling programs. We applaud their attempt to 'get legal' something that few oil and gas Companies in Texas have provided willing to do. But unfortunately this has no bearing on Couch's track record.
    Our position is always a delicate one in trying to assess investments for others, especially when we do not have enough information to make an intelligent investing decision, as in the profiling of Couch oil and gas above, especially when the Company does not answer our enquiries for further information.
    As a matter of general business and investing principles we prefer to think of investors as business partners. This is especially true in the case of Joint Ventures and General Partnerships wherein the investors legally becomes an actual partner, not just helping the Company make business decisions, but also sharing in the Company's profits and any legal liabilities incurred by the Company.
    If in fact one considers themselves a business partner, then one is entitled to get (and the Company obligated to provide) the information that any business partner needs to have to make an investing decision. The basic information that we believe is necessary is first and foremost....
    ...Evidence that the business effort may be profitable. In oil and gas that evidence can only be the track record of successful wells AND payouts to investors. We are often told by oil and gas Companies are '95% successful' in their drilling. This statement is clearly absurd. With 10,000 oil and gas Companies raising money for oil wells in Dallas/Ft Worth alone (Source: Dallas Ft Worth Newspaper). Were this track record true for all 10,000 Companies Texas would have long ago collapsed into the gulf. No we have no doubt that the record of hitting 'hydrocarbons' may be 95% with today’s technology. But since the POINT of investing is to make money we prefer to see a Company's track record of ECONOMICALLY VIABLE WELLS. i.e. wells that produce enough oil and gas to pay back (in our perspective) the investors original principle, plus a profit.
    Since oil and gas Companies, like any other corporation are required by law to keep a general ledger, retrieving the raw (inception to present) numbers of investor money in vs. money paid out to investors should not be a problem for the Company to produce to validate any claims made to new investors. After all if a Company has made money for investors they are not only willing to share it, it's difficult to keep them from bragging about it to anyone that will listen. This should be easy for Robert and Charles Couch because we are told they have been in the oil and gas business for quite sometime, and therefore should be able to provide this track record.
    If any company refuses to provide their track record of investor net profits, the investor has every right to question whether or not the Company has in fact produced net losses, or net profits, for it's investors. If a Company is unwilling in unable to provide this fundamental and basic information then any business partner would want, then any doubt cast on the management qualifications of that Company can only be laid at the feet of the Company itself.
    The need for this validation is particular true in oil and gas, a field that can be, but often is NOT as lucrative as it's many promoters claim. For instance we reviewed Swift Energy (a publicly traded oil and gas company) about ten years ago, and of the 101 production partnerships they were required by the SEC to list the results for NONE of them had reached payout (break even for investors) after a decade or more of production. If a large and well funded publicly traded Company has trouble making money for investors, how much trouble would a small private Company have doing the same thing?
    There are five other VRI requirements one can see on our website, but we are going to let those lie until this fundamental question is answers. Can Couch Oil and Gas provide to investors a track record of investor profits? Without a satisfactory answer to this question we would hesitate investing in an oil and gas Company. In fact we have asked this question of several hundred oil and gas Companies and while we have almost always been told that they do make money for investors, NOT ONE has provided documentary proof to that effect leaving such claims in a 'he said - she said' and not legally actionable category.
    If any oil and gas Company would be willing to provide this basic, commonsense validation we would be more than happy to steer thousands of investors their way. So far our request has come up as a 'dry hole'. We cannot relax this requirement because it would make no sense to do that.
    CONCLUSION;
    We can only restate what is obvious to any professional investor. NO ONE should ever allow himself to be rushed into an investment. Private investing is NOT like buying publicly traded stocks. Once in you cannot get out. So take your time, think it over, try to figure out ways to double check what you are being told, ask hard questions, take to other people who might know something about it, visit websites like this one to find out what questions you should be asking.
    NO ONE should invest in oil and gas until the Company has proven it's good faith by providing it's track record of payment to investors.
    To violate either of these basic principles is just...well, silly.
    Any investors due diligence posture should be "I believe EVERYTHING you tell me. Just prove it to me in writing."
    As far as we know Couch Oil and Gas still has not done that.

    admin
    11/15/2005 9:52:48 AM DISCLAIMER: The opinions of Guest Posters to the VRI website are not necessarily the opinions of VRI or it's staff. The information contained in such opinions are often impractical or impossible for VRI to confirm, and no one should make an assumption that any attempt has been made to confirm them. VRI cannot determine if negative information is from investors or disgruntled ex employees. VRI cannot determine if positive information is from investors, or company shills. Each investor should consider the source, and treat such postings as part of their own due diligence effort.
    WEBSITE POSTINGS
    VRI Guest posting: I found this on the Couch oil and gas website. "IRS tax incentive credits help investors use formulations that allow deductions for drill, test, completion and depletion allowances up to 200% of original well costs." I do not see how this can be. Does anyone know if this is possible?
    VRI Guest Posting: Couch Energy and other oil and gas firms are just the tip of the proverbial iceberg were investors are not only ripped-off, but also mislead about tax write-offs. As any company, your company has a certain yearly tax write-off on certain business expenses that are tax deductible. Can you or would you inflate those tax deductions by 200% or a 1000% as most oil promoters tell investors. Do you think oil and gas promoters have a special deal with the IRS, while the rest of us can only write-off actual costs and actual legitimate expenses? If you or I or any investor inflate our tax deduction, that would not only be filing a false tax return --- a felony under US Code 18 section 7201 --- but also would be tax fraud under a different section of the Code. The designers of the Couch.com website do not know the tax laws and are just soliciting naive investors to scam out of their money and life savings.
    VRI Admin Posting: I talked to an attorney that works with an oil and gas firm. We cannot vouch for this, but according to him the operator he works with looked at an 8 well package from Couch Oil. What he said is that it looks like Couch is charging investors about $2.5 to $3 million per well, which averaged 10,000 feet. That would be a drilling cost of $250 to $300 a foot. See "What does a well cost to drill, and what are they charging you?" in the oil and gas main forum page. If Couch is inflating costs by (say) 100%, that is imposing an additional 100% dilution on the 3 wells that came in, on top of the dilution incurred by the costs of the 5 failures. IF Couch if distributing this dilution to investors in the form of 200% writes offs that would account for their statement on their website of a 200% write off. Keep in mind if Couch is overmarking the cost of their wells, it does not mean they are NOT legitimate wells, just that they cost twice as much as they should reducing potential investors returns by 50%. This reduction would compensated for by giving investors a 200% write off, but if part of the 200% write off is the overpricing of the well, then the investors are exposed to possible IRS punitive action for an abusive tax shelter (or some such). Of course this is a pretty big speculative leap based on hearsay, so I suppose it's inherently unreliable.
    VRI Guest Posting: I understand Couch is forming their own broker dealer. Doesn't that show that they are operating legitimately?
    VRI Admin Posting: If they have an NASD 'broker/dealer' an oil firm is legally raising money from investors, but it does not necessarily mean they are operating legitimately. Google search Irvine Securities or American Business Securities, for just two of the hundreds of legal broker/dealers that were created by oil and gas companies to sell fraudulent deals to investors. We do not know what the case is with Couch Oil and Gas. However, the 200% write off claim on their website seems to call for at least a yellow caution flag, and a call to the IRS to see if a 200% write off is even possible...before investing of course.
    VRI Guest Posting: The only way Conch Oil could promise tax benefits worth 200% of the investment is through the Alternative Fuels Credit. The Alternative Fuels Credit would have to be grandfathered from an existing facility, and combined with depletion deduction. They should not guarantee this tax benefit, as it is based on production, which is a bit unpredictable. Hope this is helpful. I'm not an O&G expert either, but I think the 200% Conch advertises may not be realistic. The alternative fuels credit is just a guess. If you have any written information or marketing materials that give more details on how the 200% tax benefit is supposed to work, I could determine whether it is based in tax law. (CPA, name withheld)
    ADMIN: Not specifically related, however there used to be a joke about 'water in th well'. This is when they called investors and told them 'we've hit a good one, but it's been flooded because of heavy rains at the drilling site. As soon as we pump it out it's going to be a great well.' Somehow the well NEVER went into production so the speculation was that 'water in the well as a standard excuse/delaying tactic by boiler rooms. Can't say for sure, but it happened far too often to be just a coincidence. Admin
    GUEST: It seems, the guests below refer to Section 29 tax credits, that come with Coal bed Methane gas wells. Such wells are low and slow in production and an investor will never get a 100% of his investment back. After being drilled and completed, the well has to "DE-Water" for a year or two, before any gas production takes place and investors have to pay for the monthly operating expenses of disposing that water. After de-watering, Production starts and increases slowly and then declines slowly and that's all. Most likely, over the life of the well, investors paid more for water disposal, than they ever received in production revenue. Why invest to pay for water disposal ??? Water disposal will be another profit center of the oil company that owns and operates the well. Besides all the tax write off's that come with a regular oil or natural gas well, Section 29 offers an additional tax credit for every 1000 cubic feet of coal bed methane gas produced. That tax credit dollar amount -- $1 to $2 or more -- is set annually by the Federal Government and changes from year to year. Since the production of coal bed methane gas wells is slow and low, the section 29 tax credit is minimal to the investor, for it is tied to the production volume which is also minimal. Companies who offer coaled methane gas wells to investors not only hype the section 29 tax credits ,but also hype a production volume and ROI, which never happens anyway. So why invest in this ? Only the company will make money with the up front promotion! Yes folks, those wells are also promoted with inflated costs to the investors! If there is not much production, there is not much of a Section 29 tax credit. My advise, if you feel you must invest in oil or gas wells,never invest in coal bed methane gas wells, even in a multi well offering. You have a much better chance of participating in an oil gusher or giant natural gas well with your friendly neighborhood oil and gas promoter/ scam artist.
    GUEST: There a several Couch companies in the Dallas, TX area. One is a father and son outfit. The son is in charge of raising money thru a Broker/Dealer owned by this father and son team. The other Couch is in Garland, TX.
    GUEST: The only way Conch Oil could promise tax benefits worth 200% of the investment is through the Alternative Fuels Credit. The Alternative Fuels Credit would have to be grand fathered from an existing facility, and combined with depletion deduction. They should not guarantee this tax benefit, as it is based on production, which is a bit unpredictable. Hope this is helpful. I'm not an O&G expert either, but I think the 200% Conch advertises may not be realistic. The alternative fuels credit is just a guess. If you have any written information or marketing materials that give more details on how the 200% tax benefit is supposed to work, I could determine whether it is based in tax law. (CPA: name withheld)
    GUEST: Couch Energy and other oil and gas firms are just the tip of the proverbial iceberg were investors are not only ripped-off, but also mislead about tax write-offs. As any company, your company has a certain yearly tax write-off on certain business expenses that are tax deductible. Can you or would you inflate those tax deductions by 200% or a 1000% as most oil promoters tell investors. Do you think oil and gas promoters have a special deal with the IRS, while the rest of us can only write-off actual costs and actual legitimate expenses? If you or I or any investor inflate our tax deduction, that would not only be filing a false tax return --- a felony under US Code 18 section 7201 --- but also would be tax fraud under a different section of the Code. The designers of the Couch.com website do not know the tax laws and are just soliciting naive investors to scam out of their money and life savings.
    ADMIN: I talked to an attorney that works with an oil and gas firm. We cannot vouch for this, but according to him the operator he works with looked at an 8 well package from Couch Oil. What he said is that it looks like Couch is charging investors about $2.5 to $3 million per well, which averaged 10,000 feet. That would be a drilling cost of $250 to $300 a foot. See "What does a well cost to drill, and what are they charging you?" in the oil and gas main forum page. If Couch is inflating costs by (say) 100%, that is imposing an additional 100% dilution on the 3 wells that came in, on top of the dilution incurred by the costs of the 5 failures. IF Couch if distributing this dilution to investors in the form of 200% writes offs that would account for their statement on their website of a 200% write off. Keep in mind if Couch is over marking the cost of their wells, it does not mean they are NOT legitimate wells, just that they cost twice as much as they should reducing potential investors returns by 50%. This reduction would compensated for by giving investors a 200% write off, but if part of the 200% write off is the overpricing of the well, then the investors are exposed to possible IRS punitive action for an abusive tax shelter (or some such). Of course this is a pretty big speculative leap based on hearsay, so I suppose it's inherently unreliable. Admin
    ADMIN: If they have an NASD 'broker/dealer' an oil firm is legally raising money from investors, but it does not necessarily mean they are operating legitimately. Google search Irvine Securities or American Business Securities, for just two of the hundreds of legal broker/dealers that were created by oil and gas companies to sell fraudulent deals to investors. We do not know what the case is with Couch Oil and Gas. However, the 200% write off claim on their website seems to call for at least a yellow caution flag, and a call to the IRS to see if a 200% write off is even possible...before investing of course. Granted we are NOT accountants, but so far nothing we’ve seen allows a 200% write off for investors except 1) A $5 million plus well in Canada, and 2) U.S. wells where the promotional cost of raising money for the well, or other artificially inflated costs, are passed to investors as a ‘cost’ write off. We are very dubious about 2) – See big fat warning on over promoted wells. Admin
    GUEST: Couch Oil & Gas, Dyno Energy, Inc., Charles O. Couch, and William M. Wilhelm, Dallas, TX. File No. S-04061(EX). Orders of Prohibition and Revocation were issued based on allegations of fraud in the offer and sale of unregistered securities by an unlicensed broker-dealer and agent. Order issued: March 18, 2005 Website address: http://www.wdfi.org/newsroom/admin_orders/dos_default.htm
    GUEST: There is an interesting video that can be ordered from the A&E television channel's website called Dallas: Arsenic and old money (City Confidential) It can be found and purchased on the A&E Channel's website. It is very interesting to see Charles Couch in this one. Order the video it WILL enlighten.
    GUEST: Couch reverse merger with Monarch Gulf-couch acquires 50 Million shares, I wonder if next step will be to roll the 500+ investors in his general partnership into that company in exchange for paper stock? great ponzi idea. Other company is oil2 holdings. state tx franchise tax certificate not good as of 3-20-05



 
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