The ValueTheMarkets Podcast

Today’s guest on the ValuetheMarkets podcast is Mike Moles, director and co-founder of Kavango Resources (LSE:KAV). The company, which is focused on three projects in Botswana that are prospective for copper, nickel and platinum group elements metals, released an announcement on Thursday detailing its recent progress.

In the interview, Moles first discusses Kavango’s licences covering a highly prospective geological trend called the Kalahari Suture Zone. Here, he says a thorough report on the project’s economic potential by Dr David Holwell, a leading authority on magmatic sulphide deposits, is likely to be released next week.

Although Covid-19 has affected Kavango’s operations on the ground, Moles also says that a considerable amount of desktop work continues. Specifically, the firm is crunching data from recent and historic drilling results, ground geophysics and airborne surveys. 

Elsewhere, Moles discusses Kavango’s Kalahari Copper Belt Joint Venture, where it is looking to increase the size of its land position, and its Ditau project.

Kavango’s AIM peer Power Metal Resources (LSE:POW) is currently undergoing due diligence on Ditau in anticipation of acquiring a 51% working interest in the project.

Author: Stuart Langelaan

Disclosure:  The author was paid for this piece.  The author does not own shares in the company mentioned.

All opinions expressed are those of ValueTheMarkets and the respective guests unless otherwise stated and should not be construed as investment advice or a recommendation to buy shares in any featured Company. Listeners are advised to do their own extensive research before buying shares which, as with all small-cap exploration stocks, should be viewed as high risk. Investors should also seek the advice of a qualified investment adviser or stockbroker as they deem appropriate.

Today’s guest is Craig Brown, chief executive officer of Australia-focused gold explorer ECR Minerals (LSE:ECR).

In the interview, Brown talks through the reasoning and background behind ECR's disposal of its Avoca, Moombook, and Timor licenses in Victoria earlier this week to Fosterville South. 

The company has opted to focus more intensely on its extremely prospective Bailieston and Creswick licences in Central Victoria. Both are situated in good neighbourhoods with majors operating in the vicinity. 

Here, Brown reviews the prospects of both licenses and details the activities planned for both this year. 

He also runs through the third-party interest that both sites have received from third parties, which he hopes will help to accelerate their development.

Author: Stuart Langelaan

Disclosure:  The author was paid for this piece.  The author does not own shares in the company mentioned.

All opinions expressed are those of ValueTheMarkets and the respective guests unless otherwise stated and should not be construed as investment advice or a recommendation to buy shares in any featured Company. Listeners are advised to do their own extensive research before buying shares which, as with all small-cap exploration stocks, should be viewed as high risk. Investors should also seek the advice of a qualified investment adviser or stockbroker as they deem appropriate.

Today’s guest is Mike Buck, CEO of Petro Matad (LSE:MATD). The company is focussed on oil exploration in Mongolia and is targeting 3 Production Sharing Contract (PSC) Blocks ((IV, V, and XX) in which it holds a 100% working interest. Blocks IV and V are located in the frontier area of western Mongolia and Petro Matad has drilled one wildcat drill in each block, Snow Leopard- 1 and Wild Horse-1. Block XX is to the east and is adjacent to the main oil-producing province of Mongolia. Following on from the encouraging drilling results at Heron-1 discussed in an earlier podcast, ValueTheMarkets catches up with Mike again to talk about Petro Matad’s latest operational update.

Author: Stuart Langelaan

Disclosure:  The author was paid for this piece.  The author does not own shares in the company mentioned.

All opinions expressed are those of ValueTheMarkets and the respective guests unless otherwise stated and should not be construed as investment advice or a recommendation to buy shares in any featured Company. Listeners are advised to do their own extensive research before buying shares which, as with all small-cap exploration stocks, should be viewed as high risk. Investors should also seek the advice of a qualified investment adviser or stockbroker as they deem appropriate.

Today’s guest on the ValueTheMarkets podcast is Dr Ray Barlow, CEO of E-Therapeutics (LSE:ETX). The company is employing a computer-based approach to the discovery of new drugs. It's Network-Driven Discovery (NDD) platform employs techniques such as machine learning, artificial intelligence, and data analysis to find better drug solutions in a more efficient manner.

In the interview, Ray discusses the NDD platform, the company’s business model, the changes he’s made since joining the board in 2017, and talks about his background in the industry.

Author: Stuart Langelaan

Disclosure:  The author was not paid for this piece.  The author does not own shares in the company mentioned.

All opinions expressed are those of ValueTheMarkets and the respective guests unless otherwise stated and should not be construed as investment advice or a recommendation to buy shares in any featured Company. Listeners are advised to do their own extensive research before buying shares which, as with all sm

Today’s guest on the ValueTheMarkets podcast is Maurice Treacy, Chief Commercial Officer of Open Orphan (LSE:ORPH) The company is focused on rare disease and orphan drug pharma services and aims to achieve rapid growth through the acquisition of smaller, high-margin pharma service providers. Following on from our earlier podcast with CEO, Cathal Friel, Maurice focusses on discussing the technical side of the business.

One of the key offerings the firm is developing is the first Genomic Health Database. Maurice gives further details and outlines the need for the database as well as highlighting the opportunity this presents to Open Orphan.

Disclosure:  The author was paid for this piece.  The author does not own shares in the company mentioned.

All opinions expressed are those of ValueTheMarkets and the respective guests unless otherwise stated and should not be construed as investment advice or a recommendation to buy shares in any featured Company. Listeners are advised to do their own extensive research before buying shares which, as with all small-cap exploration stocks, should be viewed as high risk. Investors should also seek the advice of a qualified investment adviser or stockbroker as they deem appropriate.

Today’s guest on the ValueTheMarkets podcast is Paul Baay, President and CEO of Touchstone Exploration (LSE:TXP). Touchstone is currently undergoing a potentially transformational drilling campaign on the Ortoire Block in Trinidad, and yesterday announced higher than expected initial test rates from the first well, Coho-1.

The well was tested for seven hours using gradually increasing choke sizes with an average natural gas rate of 17.5 million cubic feet per day (mmcfd) over the period. This equates to 2,917 barrels of oil equivalent (boepd), well in excess of the company’s combined existing production of around 1800 bopd.

In the interview, Paul explains that the company chose to shorten the flowback period due to limitations of the testing equipment in handling the much higher than expected flow rates. Paul also mentions the benefits a diversification into natural gas brings to Touchstone and highlights the better economics with no Supplementary Petroleum Tax (SPT) payable.

Further tests and analysis will follow at Coho-1 shortly and the company will tie in the well via a 3 km pipeline to an existing production facility. It’s anticipated that the well will be brought onto production in the first half of 2020.

it’s worth noting that Coho is just the first, and smallest, of the four prospects Touchstone is exploring on the Ortoire Block. Drilling of the second well, Cascadura-1 is already underway with total depth expected to be reached by early December.

Disclosure:  The author was paid for this piece.  The author owns shares in the company mentioned.

All opinions expressed are those of ValueTheMarkets and the respective guests unless otherwise stated and should not be construed as investment advice or a recommendation to buy shares in any featured Company. Listeners are advised to do their own extensive research before buying shares which, as with all small-cap exploration stocks, should be viewed as high risk. Investors should also seek the advice of a qualified investment adviser or stockbroker as they deem appropriate.

Today’s guest on the ValueTheMarkets podcast is Cathal Friel, CEO of Open Orphan. (LSE:ORPH)  The company is focused on rare disease and orphan drug pharma services and aims to achieve rapid growth thorough the acquisition of smaller, high-margin pharma service providers. Open Orphan has just announced it has secured another new contract, this time with Carna Bioscience for a First In Human Clinical pharmacology trial.

The contract sees the Venn Life Sciences part of Open Orphan provide Carna with a range of expertise from chemistry manufacturing and controls to clinical trial management as well as biometry, legal and regulatory support.

In the interview, Cathal talks further about the deal and gives an update on progress of the integration of Venn Life Sciences which Open Orphan acquired via a reverse takeover earlier in the summer.

Disclosure:  The author was paid for this piece.  The author does not own shares in the company mentioned.

All opinions expressed are those of ValueTheMarkets and the respective guests unless otherwise stated and should not be construed as investment advice or a recommendation to buy shares in any featured Company. Listeners are advised to do their own extensive research before buying shares which, as with all small-cap exploration stocks, should be viewed as high risk. Investors should also seek the advice of a qualified investment adviser or stockbroker as they deem appropriate.

Today’s guest on the ValueTheMarkets podcast is Gil Holzman, CEO of Eco Atlantic Oil & Gas (LSE:ECO) which recently made two discoveries In Guyana.

Eco holds a 15% working interest alongside Total (25pc) and Tullow Oil (60pc) in the Orinduik Block in the shallow water of the prospective Suriname-Guyana basin. The oil explorer made the first major oil discovery on the Orinduik block in August with the drilling of the Jethro-1 well. This was swiftly followed with a second discovery with the drilling of the Joe-1 well. The two wells revealed the reservoirs to be high-quality sands with good permeability and on Wednesday this week, the firm gave an update on the initial analysis of fluid samples.

These initial results suggest that the samples recovered from Jethro-1 and Joe-1 are mobile heavy crudes, not dissimilar to the commercial heavy crudes in the North Sea, Gulf of Mexico, the Campos Basin in Brazil, Venezuela and Angola, with high sulphur content.

In the interview, Gil discusses the demand for heavy crude and the potential commercial viability of Eco’s discoveries.

Disclosure:  The author was not paid for this piece.  The author does not own shares in the company mentioned.

All opinions expressed are those of ValueTheMarkets and the respective guests unless otherwise stated and should not be construed as investment advice or a recommendation to buy shares in any featured Company. Listeners are advised to do their own extensive research before buying shares which, as with all small-cap exploration stocks, should be viewed as high risk. Investors should also seek the advice of a qualified investment adviser or stockbroker as they deem appropriate.

Today’s guest on the ValueTheMarkets podcast is Eytan Uliel, Commercial Director of Bahamas Petroleum Company (LSE:BPC). The company has significant prospective resources via licenses held in the Bahamas and is working towards drilling its first exploration well in Q1 2020. Bahamas Petroleum has just entered into a subscription agreement for £10.25m convertible loan notes and is currently conducting an open offer to raise up to £7m from existing shareholders.

In the interview, Eytan discusses Bahamas Petroleum’s progress towards drilling its first well and the potential prize on offer should it successfully hit hydrocarbons in the region.

Author: Stuart Langelaan

Disclosure:  The author was not paid for this piece.  The author does not own shares in the company mentioned.

All opinions expressed are those of ValueTheMarkets and the respective guests unless otherwise stated and should not be construed as investment advice or a recommendation to buy shares in any featured Company. Listeners are advised to do their own extensive research before buying shares which, as with all small-cap exploration stocks, should be viewed as high risk. Investors should also seek the advice of a qualified investment adviser or stockbroker as they deem appropriate.

Today’s guest on the ValueTheMarkets podcast is Mike Buck, CEO of Petro Matad (LSE:MATD).

Petro Matad is an oil explorer focussed on Mongolia and is aiming to make the transition to become a producer. The company has just taken a big leap towards that goal with positive results from it’s recently drilled Heron-1 well. Heron-1 is located on Block XX in eastern Mongolia, adjacent to the producing Block XIX operated by PetroChina.

Testing at Heron-1 revealed a peak flow of 821 barrels of oil per day (bopd). During the main flow period, the well was choked back to optimise the collection of pressure data. Through this period, the well flowed at an average rate of 200 bopd with a well-head flowing pressure of 250 psi. 

In the interview, Mike discusses what the results mean for Petro Matad, the steps that will be required to bring the well onto production, and discusses the company’s plans for 2020 across its acreage.

Disclosure:  The author was paid for this piece.  The author does not own shares in the company mentioned.

All opinions expressed are those of ValueTheMarkets and the respective guests unless otherwise stated and should not be construed as investment advice or a recommendation to buy shares in any featured Company. Listeners are advised to do their own extensive research before buying shares which, as with all small-cap exploration stocks, should be viewed as high risk. Investors should also seek the advice of a qualified investment adviser or stockbroker as they deem appropriate.