PETROLEUM INDUSTRY.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 11109, 25 October 1907, Page 2

PETROLEUM INDUSTRY.

"SHOW US A SIGN."

• SLOW DEVELOPMENT IX TARANAKI.

It is a little over a year since it was announced that payable oil had been struck m the Birthday petroleum well at Moturoa, and a new company was formed to develop the industry. Success was said to be assured. After a year's work, the company is compelled to confess that the success is not even now assured. T3ie drilling is still m the prospecting stage. The unsatisfactory position is. disclosed m • the balance-sheet just Issued. It shows that since the formation of the company a sum. of £15,695 has been received .fromi shareholders, and. that all this has been spent with the exception of £71 15s lying to the credit of the bank account and £145 3 S lOd set aside m connection with the flotation expenses, pending the result of litigation. In addition, there is a liability^to sundry creditors amounting to- £594 19s Bd. In round figures £16,000 has been spent by the company, £10,357 representing the actual expenditure on the five bores, indu-dang the -plant. But the outstanding fact, is that. the contributing shareholders' £16,---000 has gone, and there is nothing left to carry oh with until a new pall is available. Some strong comment is made on the condition ol affairs m the Taranaki Herald. The views expressed correspond with those of shareholders that have 'been consulted. The Herald says: "Naturally the shareholders who 'have found all the money will want to know what there is to show" for it.- . The answer will not please them. There are five holes m the ground, of varying depth, not one of which can be said to be upon payable oil, while it ia quite a speculation whether they are near to. or far from that goal. Tliere is a quantity of plant whose value depends upon the success or otherwise of the industry. It may be worth pretty well what it cost, or it may be of no more value than so much old iron. There are also a number of boring options extending chiefly over unprotected country, and a small area of freehold land. Practically the whole of the assets, set down at £68,588, have only a speculative value, and- the report and balance-sheet show plainly that the company is still only m the prospecting stage, and has established nothing^ The position of affairs when the -company was formed and took over the assets of the old' company was briefly this :' The Birthday bore was pronounced by the late 'Mr Fair to be on payable oil. ground that had been broken on the prison reserve m order to comply with the terms, of the lease, and there were a .number of options which need not be exercised for some time. The proper and obvious course was to definitely prove the Birthday bore before spending more money than -was absolutely necessary elsewhere. As .it is. a sum. of £1456 has been spent there since then r and nothing is Droved except that the oil has practically ceswed to flow from the bore, and thnt there is water m it naraVn. , "One thing is certain—that if a different policy had been pursued the £1455 spent by the company on that bore — probably a much smaller mm — would have done more to test" the locality than has now been done with an expenditure of £16,000. As it is, we ar? just as far off a' solution of the problem whether payable oil is obtainable at Moturoa as we were before the company commenced operations. The contributing shareholders have a ri^ht to complain that while they supposed their money was to be devoted to developing practically proved ground, it lms really gone m purely prospecting work, chiefly for the benefit of the. ■paid-up shareholders, whose interest m tVift company is £56.000. n.s against £31.735 held 1 ' by the contributing shareholders and that the venture is just ■gsi sneculative now o«? it was a year oioro. There is still nearly £16,000 of uncalled rapital, and it remains to be seen whether the shareholders will consent tn pay further calls to be spent upon inconclusive prftpecting."