Current Account: Exploration stocks are once again flavour of the month among high-risk investors with plenty of activity in the sector in Ireland and among the host of such companies listed on London's AIM.
The latest hot exploration stock to make its debut on the Alternative Investment Market is Afren. The small African exploration company saw its shares more than double to 56.5 pence sterling from an opening price of 20 pence when it began trading on Monday.
Afren, which aims to become a leading exploration and production company in the African oil and gas sector, has a 4.4 per cent stake in phase one of a new development in the Gulf of Guinea between Nigeria and the islands of Sao Tome & Principe.
In addition to support from an arm of the World Bank, it also has some high-profile African backers.
Like many other London-listed explorers, this one also has an Irish connection. It is headed by Brian O'Cathain, the former head of Enterprise Energy Ireland, which is developing the Corrib gas field off the Mayo coast.
Mr O'Cathain left Enterprise shortly after its acquisition by Shell in 2002, only to later join Tullow Oil as head of its international business. After two years with the most high-profile Irish exploration stock, Mr O'Cathain is taking his chances with this new start-up. And judging by this week's debut, plenty of investors seem happy to join him.
Glass more than half empty at Waterford
Shareholders in Waterford Wedgwood must be wondering just when the tide of bad news will turn. It seems scarcely credible that around four years ago, the company was reporting record profits and sales of its luxury giftware. Then, the shares were ticking along at around €1.15. Now, profits of any sort seem to be a distant aspiration and the share price dwindled to as little as three cent this week.
The latest profit warning was particularly galling for those investors - almost 75 per cent - who took up their entitlements under the recent €100 million rights issue (getting five shares for every three they already owned at six cent a share) to fund the purchase of Royal Doulton.
A couple of months later, the entire company, including Doulton is worth just €120 million on the market. The shareholders who exercised their rights are nursing a loss of around 35 per cent on their investment.
And it's not as though they can look forward to the prospect of a takeover to boost the price or restore fortunes. With a pension deficit of close to €100 million and debt of up to €240 million, Waterford Wedgwood would be a costly luxury for any buyer even before paying any money for the shares.
Time flies in High Court
Jokes from judges are usually met with laughter no matter what their quality. However the best crack to date in the Fyffes/DCC insider dealing case, has come from Ms Justice Mary Laffoy.
The case, which started in December, was billed by the barristers as taking six weeks and is now looking like it might straddle the summer break. The hearing started late a few days ago and the judge said she would sit at 11.45.
However the appointed time came and went and there was still no sign of the judge. When she did appear she said she would be giving a "qualified apology". "It seems my 11.45 is in the same league as your six weeks."
The comment got a good laugh from everyone present. Then it was back to the grind.
Laboured union support
By way of a final note on the Ictu's plan to create a holding company in which the ownership of the semi-state companies would be combined, Current Account recalls that such a plan was first mooted by the Labour Party in its 2002 general election campaign.
The Ictu paper represents the second public endorsement of Labour policies in the space of a month. Siptu president Jack O'Connor was first out of the blocks in February to support Pat Rabbitte's efforts to form a pact with Fine Gael.
However, ever the maverick, Mick O'Reilly of the ATGWU was out last Tuesday warning that a Fine Gael pact would reduce Labour to the status of an also-ran. Whatever the merits of the semi-state policy, there are more acts to come in the election debate.
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