AGORACOM Small-cap Investor Relations Blog

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has revised its global growth projections for 2007 and 2008 thanks to strong expansion from developing nations – with the bulk coming out of Asia and India, as well as, contributions from Russia.  This is great news for small-cap resource companies that are exploring for and even producing the minerals, metals, oil and other natural resources necessary to sustain their growth.  The complete entry on the IMF site is available here .  Hat tip to Paul Kedrosky for pointing it out.

Having said that, the IMF does state that “the overall balance of risks to the global growth outlook remains tilted modestly to the downside” due in part to sky-rocketing oil prices that, if not contained, can put the brakes on growth.

Finally, the IMF also has some concerns about market risk due to the deteriorating credit picture.  Though they do believe risks will be largely containted, I strongly suggest reading the story in its entirety.

Regards,
George

Good evening to you all.  While I was away on vacation in early July, the SEC released several new proposals relating to the easing of disclosure and reporting requirements for smaller public companies.  This is good news for both investors and principals of small-cap companies, though there are a couple of items that may make life a little more difficult when it comes to raising money (see comments below).

The proposals would allow companies with a public float of less than $75 million to qualify for the smaller company requirements, up from $25 million for most companies today.

The complete proposal is 180 pages long and, therefore, primarily suited for review by CEO’s and/or their legal counsel.  Investors are better off reading excellent summaries and overviews of the proposals, such as this one posted by accomplished attorney David Feldman.

We applaud the SEC for recognizing the fact that small-cap companies need relief in these areas in order to spend less time on paper work and more time on getting business done.  If you are a principals of a small-cap company, you need to take the time to read these in detail and submit comments to the SEC, which are due no later than September 17, 2007.

In the meantime, I’d like to take the time to summarize the 5 proposals but David Feldman does such a good job that I’m going to simply borrow his: (more…)

The concept of $100 oil used to seem as unreachable as a .400 batting average or $1,000 gold – but the options market and several people smarter than me are now saying it is a real possibility in 2007. In this Bloomberg exclusive, analysts from Goldman Sachs and CIBC World Markets point to both current supply and demand (very low, very high respectively) as the basis for their conclusions.

More than just words, a record number of options have been sold that give the buyer the right to buy crude oil at $100.

I highly recommend reading this article and then taking a closer look at small-cap companies that would benefit from such an event. For our part, EcoMax Energy Services is one such small-cap. They are a client but their financial performance speaks for itself.

Best,
George

The Reverse Merger Conference is now over and I walked away with both a great education and even more confidence in the future of the small-cap / micro-cap world.  For those of you that think stock spammers and message board manipulators represent the quality and identity of this space, you couldn’t be farther from the truth.

The fact of the matter is that the pool of talent, expertise, knowledge and integrity in this space runs far and deep.  Believe me, I’m not easily impressed.  I’ve sat in private meetings with Prime Ministers and Cabinet Ministers that can’t touch this group with a ten-foot ticker.  Some great examples of all sizes and walks include:

• Tim Keating of Keating Investments
• Richard Anslow of Anslow + Jaclin
• Gary McAdam and his team at Growth Ventures
• Daniel McClory at Hunter Wise Financial Group
• Nimish Patel of Richardson Patel
• Michael Williams of Williams Law Group
• Andre Schwegger of Terranova Capital Partners
• David Baker of Core Fund Management

I could go on but I’m pleased to say the list of talent was too long to mention here.  Suffice it to say, the TSX Venture Exchange sent their business development team to educate more than 300 delegates about why U.S. CEOs are considering the CPC route (Capital Pool Corporation) in Canada.

The forum topics were extensive and highly informative about important issues that surround every aspects of this business.  You can view the list and order the audio/book set here . At less than $400, you are getting the education of a lifetime.

If we have a major weakness in this space, it is our paradoxical nature in which we are bombarded by the “nothing to lose” spam companies, while the best of breed spend their time running real businesses. 

We need to change this.  For the good of our entire industry, we need to stop allowing stock spammers, direct mail promoters and message board manipulators from defining our identity.  Conferences are – and will continue to be – a great way for industry participants to amalgamate and communicate. 

But we are preaching to the converted.

We need to reach and change the impressions of Bob and Mary retail.  Doing so will open the OTCBB and Pink Sheets to a significantly wider audience of investors that will drive liquidity to utopian levels.

How do we reach them?  How do we put our best foot forward?  Web 2.0.  I’ll save that discussion for my next post – but would love to hear what others have to say.

Regards,
George

 

  

As an officer of a small-cap company, you have the major responsibility of making sure your data is secure.  Unfortunately, I also know small-cap companies are less likely to implement surfing policies for employees – and that leaves you vulnerable to picking up malware from sites that shouldn’t be visited from the office.  The results could be disastrous.

More than just lip service, consider this excerpt from a report released by ClickZ today:

Postini calculates spam and viruses to comprise over 93 percent of e-mails, up 135 percent from September 2006 rates, and a 36 percent increase over January 2007. Web-borne security threats from spyware and adware are also on the rise; the spread of online threats increased by 34.4 percent over the previous month.

…and this excerpt with respect to e-mail viruses: 

Viruses were found in one in every 145.5 e-mails received in April….MessageLabs said the majority of attacks consisted of an e-mail sent to one individual to evade signature-based malware detection. 

Lesson of the day?  Make sure your virus protection is up to date and implement a surfing policy that prohibits employees from surfing sites other than those necessary to conduct their work.  As a public company, you don’t want to risk losing critical data, company secrets or anything else that might compromise your business and market capitalization.

Regards,
George