TomWinnifrith.com

The legal battle between Aim listed Mediterranean Oil & Gas (MOG)  and AIM listed Leni Gas & Oil (LGO)  is shaping up to be a barrel of laughs for neutral observers but, not – I suspect – for Mediterranean and its CEO Dr Bill Higgs. Sources close to Leni Gas have steered us towards what appears to be a bit of a smoking gun.

By way of background: Leni sold its 10% stake in a Maltese exploration block to Mediterranean for $1 on August 1st. 23 days later Mediterranean announced a farm in deal with mighty Genel which analysts reckon valued the Leni stake at $9 million. Leni is suing claiming that Dr Higgs misrepresented the position on August 1st. This is not a case about contract law – the claim made by Leni is of misrepresentation.

Firstly it is pointed out that Leni Gas never offered to sell its shares for $1.

African Eagle (AFE) joined AIM from PLUS in June 2003. Today it is six months away from oblivion. Its rise and fall is a morality tale from the Cesspit. No-one emerges from this tale with any credit. I say this as someone who tipped the stock but a long while ago advised cutting losses.  But let’s start at the beginning. This is pretty horrific reading.

African started out as Twigg Minerals on the old Ofex market. At the time it came to AIM it was banging on about its gold assets in Tanzania: Miyabi and Iguribi.  But they were not big enough. Miyabi is now part of a JV with African having 25% but still nowhere near production. The other assets were even less spectacular.  And so to support fund raise after fund raise (there have been more than a dozen to date) the company started promoting copper assets in Zambia.

Sasare, Ndola, Lunga all were company makers we were told as investors were tapped again and again. That was until the company stumbled on something even more exciting. By 2009 the word was Dutwa – a vast Nickel find in Tanzania. The way to maximise shareholder value was to push ahead with Dutwa (oh can we raise some more money please?) and those other company makers were dropped. African had a new company maker.

I am still seething at how fundamentally AIM Cesspit posterboy Sefton Resources (SER) tried to hoodwink the market with the way it presented its results yesterday. In a near 25 year career I have never seen anything like it. It is truly scandalous.

I analysed the results in detail here.

The key point is that Sefton issued an RNS which it admitted was not IFRS compliant in that it omitted all the notes to the accounts. The full statement appeared only on its website. Only real anoraks like me bothered to read it. 99.9% of investors just read the RNS.

Thus the RNS boasted of how Sefton was profitable (albeit only just). Nowhere in the RNS was it mentioned that a material amount of the cost of employing staff, directors and consultants was capitalised (i.e. added to the balance sheet as an asset rather than run through the P&L). You only discover that if

We are all in it together said Call Me Dave as he warned us about life in austerity Britain.  But some, it appears, are more equal than others. In a rare display of solidarity, the political class is united in deciding that the basic pay of MP’s has to increase from £65,000 to £75,000. We all know there are numerous other perks.

We also know that for every seat that is remotely winnable that is an enormous line of potential applicants to fight that seat for the main parties. Would that line be any shorter if there was no pay rise? Of course not. So this is not about “attracting the right talent.” This is about a venal and corrupt political class, which does not give a damn about the views or problems of we plebs, has bugger all experience of life outside the Westminster bubble and which is happy to extract as much cash from the taxpayer as it can.

After UKIP’s spectacular success in the local elections the political class all said they would start to listen. And a few weeks later they show once again that they do not give a damn.

Incidentally would UKIP be any better? I doubt it. How about a manifest pledge from Farage: reduce the number of MPs by 50% at once by merging seats and reverse this pay rise for the ones that remain? That would show that UKIP is listening and really is different.

You know who Abu Qatada is. He reckons that there is something wrong with the UK’s welfare system. We agree on that. Abu’s specific complaint is that the five bedroom house that the taxpayer provides him with is not big enough. He needs more storage space.  Saints preserve us.  Now meet John Thuo

Back in in his native Kenya he killed between 100 and 400 people using a machete. Policemen, innocent civilians, members of other criminal gangs – he butchered the lot. He also undertook female circumcision. In 2003 he came here as an illegal immigrant and has lived in taxpayer funded accommodation and on benefits ever since.

The Home Office tried to boot him out but failed because it would infringe his Human Rights. You see, he might get murdered by his old gang back in Kenya. Apparently Thuo also has mental health problems and says he might top himself if we boot him out.

Of course if I say that these cases shows our immigration and welfare system is flawed, the deluded lefties and liberal elite respond in three ways:

1. Anyone who says the immigration system is flawed must be a racist.
2. These are exceptional cases and very rare – most of the time our system works fine.
3. The Daily Mail has reported these cases and so this is just right wing scaremongering, gosh we hate the Daily Mail, let’s talk about what an awful paper it is.

Whatever. The UK has a £100 billion budget deficit. We are going bust. These gents add to that deficit. They contribute nothing to our society. They will not seek work.

I fail to understand why anyone who has never worked should get any benefits at all. Whether the scrounger is an  Islamofacist hate preacher/probably terrorist, a Kenyan mass murderer or a white chav from some Grim Northern Shot Hole appearing on the Jeremy Kyle show.

In the case of Mr Thuo I cannot see why we are protecting him from justice in Kenya. Why cannot we hand him over to the Kenyan Police? If his gang manage to get at him or he tops himself do I really care? Do you?



It is hard to know where to start with the 2012 Annual Results from AIM Cesspit listed director lifestyle, ooops meant to say oil production, company Sefton Resources (SER) there is so much in them that begs questions rather than providing real knowledge. But suffice to say: the outlook is grim.



But let’s start with Note 1 which is a Sefton classic:

“The summary financial statements set out above have been prepared in accordance with International Financial Reporting Standards (“IFRS”). These summary financial statements do not constitute financial statements in accordance with IFRS as they omit substantially all the disclosures required by IFRS.  A full set of audited financial statements will be published prior to Sefton’s Annual General Meeting and will be available at www.seftonresources.com”



In other words there are a series of disclosures here which are not on the RNS. But if you go over to the Sefton website all the disclosures are in there. Why go to the bother of producing two separate documents? Er… because most folks will just read the RNS. This is just utterly classic Sefton.

So what little horrors are being hidden away? Well let’s start with note 5.

Aim listed Mediterranean Oil & Gas (MOG) has hit back hard at Leni Gas & Oil (LGO) following Friday’s preliminary court hearing in which Leni appeared to triumph.

Mediterranean has issued an RNS stressing that this hearing was only to allocate costs (which Leni did win on) and to set timetables. However sources close to Mediterranean have contacted ShareProphets and gone rather further.

It is Leni’s claim that it was misled by Mediterranean as to the nature of the latter’s discussions with Genel prior to selling 10% of a Maltese Exploration block for just $1 on August 1st 2012. 23 days later Mediterranean announced a tie up with Genel which would, according to analysts, have been worth $9 million to Leni had it not sold.

Leni’s claim is that it was misled by Mediterranean prior to the sale.

However,

A shock High Court Ruling made on Friday (but not announced) paves the way for a windfall gain of $9 million (or more) for AIM listed Leni Gas & Oil (LGO) at the expense of Cesspit listed Mediterranean Oil & Gas (MOG).

The background to the case is that on August 1st 2012 Leni sold its 10% stake in acreage known as Malta Area 4 Production Sharing Contract for $1 plus about $20,000 of historic expenses. Leni agreed to the sale on the basis that Mediterranean insisted that there was nothing going to happen to the block. On 23rd August Mediterranean sold 75% of the block to oil major Genel for

 an immediate cash payment of US$10 million

100% carry of the cost for the first exploration well Hagar Qim 1

100% carry of the cost for the second exploration well up to a maximum of US$30 million

AIM Cesspit pin-up boy Sefton Resources is suing me for libel over my oft repeated claims that it misled investors principally with regard to oil output last summer and that this caused its then adviser Fox Davies to do the honourable thing and resign.

ShareProphets can exclusively reveal that AIM listed gold miner Vatakoula (VGM) has negotiated a deal whereby a major Chinese mining group will invest £4.5 million at 15p per share – this compares to a Friday share price of 6.5p.

Fracking is sex on a share certificate. Mention the F word and you can set whatever daft price you want. That seems to be the theory behind Bison Energy Services, a company trying to raise funds for an AIM IPO right now. The promotion for this is a hoot.