Topic: How To Invest

Hi Pat: What is your opinion of Pulse Seismic and Exco Technologies?

Article Excerpt

Pulse Seismic, $3.53, symbol PSD on Toronto (Shares outstanding: 60.4 million; Market cap: $215.6 million; www.pulseseismic.com), buys, sells and licenses seismic data to clients in Western Canada. Pulse’s main business is seismic-data licensing. It has built a library of seismic research that it licenses to clients, mostly oil and gas companies. Pulse usually buys seismic-survey data from oil and gas firms. It also performs what it calls “participation seismic surveys.” Oil and gas producers pay Pulse to participate in these surveys in return for a perpetual, non-exclusive license to use the newly generated data. The company owns the data the surveys generate and adds it to its library. Oil and gas firms, which may use different scientific models in their exploration, can then lease various selections and combinations of the data. Pulse’s shares reached an all-time high of $4.43 in mid-July 2013 but then quickly declined to as low $3.25 when the company announced that its revenue fell sharply in…