Houston, Oct. 21 (BLOOMBERG) -
National-Oilwell Inc.'s shares rose 22 percent on speculation that the oilfield equipment and services company may be a takeover candidate, an analyst said.
Shares of the ninth-largest U.S. oilfield equipment and services company rose 2 1/2 to 13 5/8 on trading of 427,200 shares, exceeding the three-month daily average of 364,900 shares.
Yesterday Charles Lemonides, managing director and portfolio manager at Sterling Advisors, told Bloomberg Forum that Halliburton Co. and Schlumberger Ltd. maybe interested in taking over National-Oilwell.
Sterling Advisors owned 28,047 shares of National-Oilwell as of June.
"There is an impression that National-Oilwell is particularly cheap and probably vulnerable to a takeover", said George Gaspar, a Robert W. Baird & Co. analyst who rates NOI shares "accumulate".
Shares of NOI rose 42 percent in the past five trading days. They have fallen 66 percent in the last 12 months.
Houston based National-Oilwell declined to comment on whether it's in talks with another company. Steven Krablin, the companys CFO, said NOI would consider aquisition or merger combinations that would benefit shareholders, including being aquired. "We're always looking at aquisitions and our concern is not whether we are survivors or not," Krablin said.
Officials at Halliburton, the worlds largest oilfield company, and Schlumberger, the second largest, delined to comment on the speculation.
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Editorial - I have researched any insider activity on this stock and in September a significant number of shares had been purchased by an investment group (over 19.5%) of the outstanding float purchased between $9.50 and $12.69 - very interesting!
Even without these takeover speculations, this stock has been severly punished this year, no particular reason, just due to industry worries. NOI met earnings on Wednesday ($0.40) for the quarter and while continued pressures on oil prices will keep equipment purchases down in the next couple of quarters, the share price is so depressed that it should trade in the 20's to be in line with the rest of the companies in this sector - IMHO |
