While our PNG government ignores the fact that it could be providing free natural gas for cooking, gas powered vehicles, etc. to the citizens of PNG, American shareholders in the middle of the biggest financial crisis in over 70 years rejoice that our government has welcomed their InterOil into our country as one of those foreign investors who are going to help us develop.
Instead InterOil is helping make a lot of american shareholders very very rich! Good on ya, InterOil! Keep charging PNG's citizens the price of diesel and kero as if it had been shipped from Singapore!
InterOil Soars on Morgan Stanleys Partner Outlook (Update2)
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By Joe Carroll
Sept. 18 (Bloomberg) -- InterOil Corp., a Papua New Guinea oil refiner, jumped 20 percent after a Morgan Stanley analyst said the company is close to finding a partner to bankroll a stalled $6 billion liquefied-natural-gas project.
InterOil, which is based in Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, and is run from Cairns, Australia, rose $7.04 to $41.69 in New York Stock Exchange composite trading. The shares earlier reached $41.90, the biggest intraday percentage gain since Nov. 26.
The stock, which trades under the IOC ticker, has almost tripled in price this year as Chief Executive Officer Phil Mulacek discovered oil and gas in onshore wells and sought partners to help build an LNG plant.
We see compelling risk/reward and believe IOC is poised for a major transformation, Calio wrote in a note distributed to clients today. Calio, who has an overweight rating on the shares, expects InterOil to sell a 35 percent stake in the LNG project by the end of this year.
InterOil, which has no reserves after a decade of prospecting, has been holding talks with oil producers, utilities and institutional investors since February, when Bank of America Corp.s Merrill Lynch sold its 35 percent stake back to InterOil and Clarion Finanz AG, the other partner in the project.
InterOils nascent LNG plant would compete with a group led by Irving, Texas-based Exxon Mobil Corp., which is planning a $12.5 billion development in the South Pacific nation. InterOils annual sales, derived almost entirely from the 32,000-barrel-a-day refinery it opened in the capital Port Moresby in 2004, are one-400th the size of Exxon Mobils.
Mulacek founded InterOil in the 1990s when he disassembled an Alaskan oil refinery, refurbished it in Texas and shipped it to Papua New Guinea. The refinery gave Mulacek a foothold to acquire exploration rights in the Eastern Papuan Basin.
To contact the reporter on this story: Joe Carroll in Chicago at jcarroll8@bloomberg.net
Last Updated: September 18, 2009 16:21 EDT
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