Thank you Lanman for your reply. Impatience is one of my better qualities.

There is one thing that still goes around in my mind. Regardless of the reasons or excuses of how and why, the fact is that Falcon did attempt to test the wells using the best technolgy that $300 million could buy, and those tests were not satisfactory. Had they been, we would have been in a commanding position to extract larger payments from XOM in the JV, rather than giving away the largest percentage for what is not really a lot of money (if you doubt this point, stand back and think that XOM bought a huge BCGA which at the moment stands high on the academic pile). So, rightly or wrongly, technology has so far not been our friend here. Gus's comment about the hopeful sucessful importation of the technology leaves much to be desired without an expansion on those thoughts. Hence my comment about the notion that Mako may turn out to be technologically too difficult and the bottom of the pile. If one were able to say that BCGA X in country Y had similar extreme conditions on the aggregate, not single factors, and it was comercially successful, then one would have much greater confidence in the present for Mako. This lack of confidence is reflected in the low share price today. If confidence in XOM making things work were high, we should see FO share price well above a dollar or two. After all we are only few months away from the first reality check. Now I think that unless Phase 1 turns into a total flop, XOM will proceed to phase 2. I agree with you that XOM would have learned the lessons of previous failures. That is what the technical staff gets paid for and XOM has the cash to pay for the best research and staff. So an adaptation of the technology in Mako is to be expected. That is no assurance that they are capable of working sucessfully in a BCGA that unlike others is at the extreme and perhaps places it at the bottom of the technical pile.

I recommended your post.

db