Great report, Alan, and much appreciated.
Your observations on the trading patterns are right on.
Unless you are extremely fast on your feet, it's best to just
buy and hold. The product seems to be for real and it's market
is unconceivably large. Even if it's just YAA "Yet Another Ethanol"
still the market for it is huge and the company is handling the
distribution concept in an interesting way with the "mobile" plant
design. This is really good stuff.
I have been harboring a concern about the repeated "world-wide
patent rights" language. Having been down the patent path myself
(two applications filed), I have some insight viz my patent attorney
about the complications of foreign patents ... you have to file
separately in each country, one by one, and pay humongous fees for
each country in which you want coverage. There is no "global"
patent system ... the would-be patenter has to deal with each
country on it's own terms ... and in it's own language! One of
the stiffest fees for foreign patent filings is the translation
costs. Only exception to the onesies-rule is that you can get a
weak form of protection for a cluster of european countries with
a single filing ... but the protection is not as strong as
separate filings in each country.
So when I've heard "world-wide patent rights in 100 countries",
I've grit my teeth a bit, since I KNOW the writer of that language
didn't have a clue what they were claiming. Actually, there are
deadlines to file applications in foreign countries after filing
for a US Patent ... so the company would have had to perform
individual filings in each of 100 countries (at maybe $20,000 each)
for a total of $20M dollars in patent fees and costs.
So, even though I am no patent expert, the loose (to me) claims
being thrown around in the PRs were setting my teeth on edge.
So, I will take an action item to call Fisher and discuss this.
I haven't, because the "world-wide" business is moot ... I only
care about the US market right now ... and the loose language is
not a red flag to me ... just a "tooth gritter" ... I can understand
how such an exaggeration can easily occur in intra-corporate communication.
And, hey, it may be fact. I don't know yet and will report.
I have examined the US patents in detail and they appear to be
in good shape. |
