Thursday, July 19, 2012

Earnings Heads-up: "Guar sowing down in India, still time to catch up" (SLB; HAL; BHI)

With guar prices having risen from $1.50 to $25.00 per Kilo and with both Schumberger and Halliburton blaming guar for their Q1 earnings shortfalls and issuing warnings for Q2, all eyes turn to Rajasthan. (well mine, anyway)
Indian market intelligence purveyor Three Headed Lion will sell you their 2012 Guar Gum Report: INDIA for $2975.
There's big money in guar.
Both BHI and SLB report tomorrow, Halliburton on Monday.
Since the Indian authorities suspended futures trading guar only trades physical. This morning's market report: GUAR: Guar and guar gum maintained their last close in thin trading.
 
From Reuters India:

Sowing of guar seed, crucial for the global shale gas industry, is sharply down in the world's key producing region of Rajasthan in India due to scant rain, official data showed, but farmers still have a month to boost planting over last year.

As of Tuesday, guar seed had been sown on 741,000 hectares in Rajasthan state, which accounts for 80 percent of India's total output, compared with 1.3 million hectares in the same period a year ago, the state farm department data showed.

India is the world's largest producer and exporter of guar gum, supplying 80 percent of global demand.
Industrial guar gum is used in drilling and in hydraulic fracturing or fracking -- a process used in the extraction of gas from shale, which has transformed energy supplies notably in the United States.

"So far rains are lower than normal in our state. Many areas in western Rajasthan have not received rains yet, due to which sowing is weak," said an official at the state farm department....MORE