Although 88 Energy’s (88E) massive 64% share price rise was something of a conundrum to some traders, given that the company had updated the market as recently as the previous session, it perhaps should not have been a total surprise. The RNS said that Rig 111 had commenced drilling the Merlin-1 well at 0338 on 10th March 2021 (AK time). It added that the Merlin-1 well will initially be drilled to 1,500′, then surface casing will be installed and the Blow Out Preventer system tested. This was expected to take approximately one week to execute. That said, judging by the spike in the stock price, it would appear that an accelerated timeline may be on the cards, and presumably a rather favourable result. The fact that there was no “speeding ticket” RNS either means that the market has got ahead of itself, or that on a Friday perhaps City types feel that the explanation of the signficant share price movement can wait until Monday.
With Premier African Minerals (PREM), there were a few lessons for traders to learn regarding the multi-commodity mining and natural resource development company. The first was that the shares have been rising for a week ahead of today’s news, underlining the psychic abilities of many in the small cap space. The second point to note was the share price rise was for a company which hitherto has not exactly had the blue chip cache of a BHP Billiton or Anglo American, and perhaps needs to consolidate its newly found favour amongst investors. The final factor was the price action on the day: a massive spike from a 0.31p open to 0.495p peak early in the session on the latest EPO regarding the Zulu Lithium and Tantalum claims . This will have left some in the market caught high and dry on a move in a stock which may take a while to revisit the best levels of the session. One of the reasons that traders take profits “too soon” is to avoid being stranded out of pocket at a peak. The latest price action at Premier African underlined why they have a habit of not running profits.
A rather more straightforward situation was ongoing at tech investor All Active Asset Capital (AAA). Here the shares edged up on the latest TR1 news from billionaire backed Ramsey Limited, which moved up from 4.93% to 6.11% on the share register. Ramsey already has an option to subscribe for up to 100 million new ordinary shares in AAA, exercisable at 50p per new AAA Share. This compares to the latest closing price of the stock at 37.6p.
There are strategic investments, and there is the latest from SPAC Mustang Energy (MUST), which received a 27% share price. Here we saw the company issue 1,671,600 new Ordinary Shares at a price per share of 10p raising gross proceeds of £167,160. Mustang said the Placing proceeds will be used to provide additional working capital for the Company and to allow it to have sufficient cash resources to undertake due diligence on future potential acquisitions. The subscriber of the Placing shares is Acacia Resources which has a focus on minerals involved in the energy transition process. Mustang shares closed at 23.5p, a massive thumbs up in terms of the premium on the Placing price.
Speaking of SPACs, there was a distinctly SPACish vibe at Immedia (IME), with professional buying investor interest adding to the existing “All Star” shareholder register. The shares pushed up 7% with traders speculating on what business may or may not finally be injected into this company. In the meantime traders have plenty of time to focus on the January RNS in the wake of the £3m fund raise. In it, IME said that “The Group’s objective for 2021 is to deliver top line growth; the strategic plan for the year is centred upon organic growth through a) a systematic programme of cross-and upselling to the Group’s existing blue chip client base and b) new business development across all existing product and service offerings to new clients.”
Next generation investing looks as though it could and should be something which is a wave to surf for quite some time. It is also the case that the pre-IPO investing segment is feeling the benefit of the massive furlough / pandemic liquidity boom. As well as Vela Technologies (VELA), which has had recent successes including Mode (MODE) and Kanabo (KNB), shares in both Pires (PIRI) and Riverfort (RGO) continued to rise off the back of the forthcoming Pluto Digital Assets float in which both have a signficant stake in the oversubscribed entity,.
Interestingly, it would appear that things are finally on the move share price wise at Pharoah Energy (PHAR), both in the run up to preliminary results on April 7, and after the Asia-MENA focused independent oil and gas exploration and production company’s £9.6m Placing, Subscription and Retail Offer in January, which looks to have worked its way out of the system, according to the latest share price rise to 25p. Some in the market were judging the company to now be in the value zone.
One of the highlights of the recent history of investing group Gunsysnd (GUN) has been the frequency of its liquidity events, something which has set it apart from analogous groups in its space, and has garnered favour in the market. The latest here was the start of trading of its premium spirits company on Aquis, with Gunsynd holding 24.8% of Rogue Baron. The company said that the listing of Rogue Baron follows those of its other investee companies Empress Royalty, Angold Resources and Rincon Resources in a short period of time. In addition, it looked forward to Low6, its UK based, influencer led, B2B pool betting platform, listing in Q2 2021.
Also on Aquis, Upper Thames Holding (UPPT), to be renamed Valereum Blockchain, announced its financial results for the nine months ending 31st December 2020. It has recently raised new capital of £516,000 gross and announced a new strategy working in the blockchain and crypto markets, to provide a blockchain bridge between the conventional debt and equity markets and the multiple billions of crypto assets across the world. It also unveiled the appointment of digital assets “rock star” Vinay Gupta, CEO of Mattereum, as Chairman of its Advisory Board.
Disclaimer:
Zakmir.com is a purely journalistic website – Zak Mir is a member of the National Union of Journalists. There is no intention here of providing financial advice. It is recommended you seek an independent professional opinion before deciding whether or not to take any action with regard to anything written here. The author may or may not own shares in the companies mentioned.
*The author owns shares in All Active Asset Capital
