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

To: Chuzzlewit who wrote (23146)	6/1/1998 8:03:00 AM
From: marc chatman	Respond to of 95453

Thanks for the comments from VL. I was reading VRC's 1st Q report yesterday, and the picture looks pretty good to me. The increase in backlogs was twice the amount of revenues for the quarter. Margins increased slightly, but so did SG&A (in % terms). The company also increased the % of revenues it spends on R&D (4% to 5%). And I think someone on the thread was asking which companies would benefit from the move to deeper water. VRC's report seems to indicate they will. "This increase [in order bookings] is primarily due to orders associated with the upgrading and construction of offshore drilling rigs, particularly floating rigs that are capable of drilling in water depths exceeding 3,000 feet." One additional note, VRC states that "n accordance with industry practice, orders and commitments are cancelable by customers at any time." However, VRC has deposits of about 15% of the order backlog, and I suppose the deposits would be forfeited upon cancellation. (Disclosure: long VRC) Oh yeah, July Brent down .19.