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Gold/Mining/Energy : Strictly: Drilling and oil-field services -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Chas who wrote (6661)	1/5/1998 7:58:00 PM
From: The Perfect Hedge	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 95453

All:From The Motley Fool- Boring Portfolio Report Monday, January 5, 1998 by Greg Markus (TMFBoring@aol.com) ANN ARBOR, Mich. (Jan. 2, 1998) -- The Boring Portfolio managed to post a small gain today despite a $3 5/16 dive in shares of marine services leader Tidewater (NYSE: TDW), to $50 3/16. Offsetting that loss were fractional gains in five of the other seven holdings. Pretty much any stock connected with the oil and gas industry fell sharply today as the spot price on crude oil slipped below the $17 mark. Industry analysts attribute the decline to everything from concerns about weakening Asian demand to the possibility of increased Iraqi sales to unseasonably warm weather in the northern U.S. (It approached 50 degrees here in Michigan today, and regular gas is under a buck a gallon at some stations -- cheaper than the bottled water selling inside). Tidewater faced the added pressure of having been named as a prime "short" candidate by Prudential's Ralph Acampora on "Wall Street Week" Friday. Acampora is Pru's chief technician, so I can't tell you whether he can knows a supply boat from a surfboard. One person who does, however, is a fella by the name of Bill, who posts regularly under the screenname of "Gapped Up" in the Oil & Gas Industry area within The Motley Fool's site on AOL. Bill (who, citing company policy, declined to give his full name) described himself to me as a geophysicist with a large oil service company in Houston and an 18-year industry veteran. He posted a note recently to say that his company "has chartered vessels from Tidewater and others, and I can tell you most assuredly that vessel day rates continue to rise, although the rate of acceleration has slowed from the explosive rate increases of the last two years." "This is not news to anyone familiar with the industry," he added. Bill concluded, "I am not a shareholder in Tidewater, and I don't care whether people buy or sell the stock. But I do want people to understand the facts, and I hope they do not blindly follow the supposed wisdom of so-called analysts."