SapCrest, Kencana and Petrofac in JV to develop Berantai

PETALING JAYA: Sapura Crest Petroleum (SapCrest), Kencana Petroleum and Petrofac Energy Developments, a unit of London-listed Petrofac, has entered into a joint venture (JV) to develop and operate the Berantai field located 150km offshore Terengganu.

A risk service contract was signed by Petronas and the operating parties to carry out the development and production of petroleum resources from the Berantai field while a joint operating agreement was also signed between the operating parties.

The contract would be for nine years commencing Jan 31, 2011 with first gas from the project expected by the end of Dec 2011.

Separate filings by SapCrest and Kencana to the stock exchange showed that both would have a 25% stake in the joint operating agreement with Petrofac owning the remainder stake.

Under the agreement, the operating parties would provide one well-head platform with 18 wells (expected to be completed by end-2012) together with related pipeline linking it to another existing platform and the provision of a floating production, storage and off-loading vessel (FPSO).

Additionally, the operating parties would also have the right to deploy works and services to the project while a second well-head platform would be installed in a subsequent phase.

The total development cost including for the subsequent phase, to be incurred collectively by the operating parties, was estimated at this juncture at approximately US$800 million excluding the provision of the FPSO.

Read more...

KL bourse set to consolidate further

Share prices on Bursa Malaysia is likely to dip next week with the market barometer testing the 1,500-points level as investors abstain from the market, taking a break for the Chinese New Year holidays.

The stock market will be closed on Feb 1 for the Federal Territory Day and for the Chinese New Year celebrations on Feb 3 and Feb 4. The local bourse will only trade for two days next week.

Affin Investment Bank Head of Retail Research Dr Nazri Khan said the market would continue to consolidate as investors off-load their positions due to next week's holiday-shortened trading week.

He said rumours of impending fiscal tightening by the central bank, using creative measures or non-traditonal measures such as properties, margin and reserve requirement, is expected to exert slight pressure on local market sentiment.

External factors which would continue to weigh on market sentiment next week would include rising inflationary pressure following the hike in oil and commodity prices.

"Further fiscal tightening is expected in China and India to address a property bubble and this is anticipated to impact local sentiment as both nations are Malaysia's big trading partners," Nazri told Bernama.

However, he said the undertone of the market was still intact.

For the week-just ended, sentiment remained bearish as profit-taking in heavyweight counters, despite a mild rebound on Thursday, dragged prices lower.

Read more: KL bourse set to consolidate further

Stock Rally Hits the Skids

The market falls to a level it touched on 2011's first day of trading

Well, that was quick.
If traders needed a reminder what real stock-market volatility looked like, or how quickly two-plus weeks of grinding gains can be evaporated, Friday was the perfect day.
When the dust had cleared, the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged 166 points to 11,824, the Nasdaq fell 2.5% to 2687, and the S&P 500 was off 1.8% to 1276. The S&P 500 found itself closing at a level where it had first ended on Jan. 5, and has now essentially cut in half its gain for the month and year.

At least the Nasdaq had a specific stimulus — a weak earnings report by Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) late Thursday, which included a miss on fourth-quarter revenue and drastically lower forecast for first-quarter operating profit, put traders on alert that it could be a rough session for tech stocks.

Still, to the general investor there was reason for optimism: the Nasdaq had returned to its old outperforming ways for much of this week, so a day off wasn’t necessarily cause for alarm for the broader market. Plus, both the Dow and S&P 500 were flirting with big, round numbers to attain (12,000 and 1300) that seemed within reach — especially on a Friday, with nothing but recent bullish momentum at play.

Read more...

NB: TWO trading days b4 cny 2011!

Pre-CNY Sell Off 2010 and 2011

Investors take profits ahead of CNY holidays

THE stock market's main benchmark suffered its second double-digit drop in four trading days, wiping out all of its gains so far this year.

The FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI fell 16.54 points to 1526.43 points. Yesterday's close was 0.46 per cent lower than the new year's first day close of 1533.42 points.

The benchmark index closed at a record of 1574.49 points last Monday.

Maybank Investment Bank Bhd's head of retail research Lee Cheng Hooi said the blue chip index could fall to as low as 1525 points.

"The market is sluggish, and some funds are getting out a bit," said Lee, adding traditionally buying interest will come back after the Chinese New Year (CNY) holidays.

The market will still have to breach the 1576 level to sustain a rise. Lee said the research house has a year end 1710 target.

Mercury Securities head of research Edmund Tham, meanwhile, believes that foreign funds are still in the market but they may have taken some profits ahead of the lunar new year.

"Some of them may have locked in gains, ahead of the long holiday period, as they will not be able to react to what's happening in the US and Europe during the period," said Tham.

Next week, the market will be closed for three trading days. On February 1, Bursa is closed for the Federal Territory public holiday, while on the 3rd and 4th, it will be closed for the Chinese New Year.

"The ringgit is strong and Malaysia is an inflation steady country unlike the Philippines and Indonesia," opined Tham to support his assessment that the exchange here is still being eyed by foreign funds.

The ringgit yesterday closed stronger against the US dollar to RM3.0525, as the currency approached a 13-year high. The ringgit reached RM3.0475 on January 14, the strongest level since October 1997.

Normally, a currency would weaken when there is an outflow of funds, while it becomes stronger when there is greater demand.

Normally, a currency would weaken when there is an outflow of funds, while it becomes stronger when there is greater demand.

Read more: Investors take profits ahead of CNY holidays

One Trading Week To CNY - FBM KLCI closes at 3wk low as funds take profit

KUALA LUMPUR: The FBM KLCI closed at a three-week low on Friday, Jan 21, the worst performance since this year as some funds took money off the table, in line with key regional markets on concerns about more monetary tightening policies by China's government.

At 5pm, the KLCI was down 19.08 points or 1.22% to 1,547.43, the lowest since Jan 3 when trading started for the year. Turnover was 1.89 billion shares valued at RM3.16 billion. Declining counters battered advancers 717 to 185 while 224 stocks were unchanged.

Most regional markets also ended in the red, with losses ranging from 0.5% to 2.16%. South Korea's Kospi skidded 1.74% to 2,069.92 -- retreating from an all-time high of 2,119.24 on Wednesday.-- as investors took profits after the main index hit record highs earlier this week, and as concerns about further Chinese monetary policy tightening weighed on shares of big exporters.

Japan's Nikkei 225 1.56% to 10,274.52, Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index 0.53% to 23,876.86 and Singapore's Straits Times Index 0.68% at 3,183.81.

Jakarta's Composite Index was the worst, down 2.16% to 3,379.54. However, China's markets managed to recover part of Thursday's losses, with the Shanghai Composite Index up 1.4% to 2,715.29.

Analysts said foreign funds were taking some money from the regional markets, which was evident from the selling of Jakarta blue chips.

At Bursa Malaysia, KL Kepong fell the most, down 52 sen to RM22.34, PPB and Kulim 30 sen each to RM17.20 and RM13.28 while Batu Kawan shed 26 sen to RM16.92 and IOI Corp six sen to Rm5.89

CIMB fell 30 sen to RM8.34, dragging the KLCI down by 5.28 points while Genting's 32 sen decline to RM11.36 pushed the index down by another 2.8 points. Other banks also fell, with Maybank down 10 sen to RM8.81 and AMMB 14 sen to RM6.76.

Petronas Chemicals fell 15 sen to RM6.20 after a news wire said was due to a downgrade at Macquarie Group Research from "Outperform" to "Neutral".

Read original here