Topic: How To Invest

Pat: What do you think of Open Range Energy? Thanks.

Article Excerpt

Open Range Energy, $6.82, symbol ONR on Toronto (Shares outstanding: 60.9 million; Market cap: $468.2 million; www.openrangeenergy.com), is an oil and natural gas producer that operates in Alberta. In June 2010, Open Range began a new business: renting its Poseidon Concepts fracturing fluid tanks to producers of shale oil and shale gas. Shale gas and shale oil are trapped in rock formations. To extract them, companies must pump water and chemicals (fracturing fluids) into the rock. This fractures the rock and releases the natural gas or oil. Open Range now rents 100 tank systems across North America. The company believes that its large tanks are more efficient than other tanks, because they can hold much more fracturing fluid, are easier to transport, and have a more efficient fluid-heating process. Open Range designed the tanks, but other companies make them. In the three months ended March 31, 2011, Open Range’s revenue jumped 69.6%, to $19.5 million from $11.5 million from a..