Geo-political tensions are mounting in the global energy game. And that could make investing in oil right now the trade of the year, says Manraaj Singh. Buying shares of oil majors is a good move now. But Manraaj says quality mid-sized oil companies are best placed to return big profits in the next oil bull run.

This from Fleet Street Invest:

Israeli tanks have just rolled into Gaza…Almost three thousand miles away, Nigerian separatist blew-up an oil pipeline over the weekend…Meanwhile, Russia is locked in a dispute over the price of gas with Ukraine. Today they stopped deliveries of natural gas to Ukraine, Turkey and Europe to force the Ukrainians to pay up…

While fears about political instability drive the price of oil back up again, the OPEC oil barons are tightening the screws on global oil supplies…Oil was trading at just $35 per barrel on Christmas Eve. It’s over $50 this

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As the market price of crude oil falls, it reaches a point where the cost of new exploration projects exceeds the potential rewards. And that point is dangerous for small cap GETECH (LON:GTC), which provides specialist geographical data to the oil industry. Tom Bulford says the company may be undervalued, given its strong assets and customer base. But uncertainty over oil prices remains a key risk to operations.

More from Penny Sleuth:

News that Shell is to halt development of its vast Canadian tar sands project is a sign of changing times in the oil industry – and one that will not be well received at the AIM-listed provider of data to the oil industry, GETECH (LON:GTC). This is a pity because last week’s annual results statement revealed a share that looked extremely cheap and prompted an 80% rise in its price from 16p to 30p.

The question that affects ...

The typhoon of commentary that’s blown around the world a step behind the financial tsunami that’s wrecking everything, two little words have been curiously absent: “fraud” and “swindle.” But aren’t they really at the core of what has happened? Wall Street took the whole world “for a ride” and now a handful of Wall Street’s erstwhile princelings have shifted ceremoniously into U.S. Government service to “fix” the problem with a “toolbox” containing a notional two trillion dollars.

This strange exercise in financial kabuki theater will shut down sometime between the election and inauguration day, when the inaugurate finds himself president of the Economic Smoking Wreckage of the United States. What will happen?

I have thought for some time that things could get dangerously out of hand in America, despite our exceptionalist notion that we are immune to the common plot-lines of history. For starters, inauguration night will seem more like

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Washington appears to finally be paying the cost of ignoring Latin America for so many years as Russia swoops into the vacuum. This comes from Dan Erikson of the Inter-American Dialogue: Moscow's outreach to the region is by no means confined to Hugo Chavez and his closest allies. In June 2004, Putin made the first-ever visit to Mexico by Russian premier for talks focusing on military sales, and later that year he attended the APEC summit in Chile and then visited Brazil to initiate cooperation in satellite technology and oil exploration. In 2007, the Russian leader visited Guatemala and then promised to cooperate with the country on electricity production, prompting then-President Oscar Berger to describe Putin as "one of the brightest leaders in today's world." Russian arms sales to the region amounted to only $300 million from 1998 to 2001, but they have since escalated dramatically. In 2006, Russia's ...

Smaller oil exploration companies across the UK’s energy sector will struggle to keep afloat due to debt refinancing issues caused by the financial crisis. Gazprom is looking likely to post some of its strongest profit margins this quarter due to the high price of natural gas. European overdependence on supplies from Russia is problematic due to potential shortfalls, not intentional volatility, suggests this article. The US has removed North Korea from its blacklist of terrorists after an inspection of its nuclear capabilities. The consumer price of gasoline in the US has recorded its largest drop of all time, falling 35 cents a gallon over the weekend.

David Einhorn, founder of investment firm Greenlight Capital, and the genius who called Lehman Brothers’ demise has turned his attention to the energy sector.

Einhorn raised his stake in Helix Energy Solutions, adding 2.47 million shares since Sept. 10. Entities controlled by Einhorn now own a 13.8% stake in the oil exploration and services company.

Track Greenlight’s buys and sells at:

http://trackthepros.com/stocks/category/152

Since March, Einhorn’s funds have more than doubled his holdings in Helix. They owned about 5% of the company in March, but have been accumulating shares at a rapid pace more recently. Since passing the 10% ownership threshold earlier this month, Einhorn’s funds have bet more than $67 million on Helix, buying shares at an average price of $27.14.

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Financial News at Sibos September 16, 2008A series of setbacks has raised questions over whether Moscow could rival other centres and whether the rouble could become a reserve currency, writes Jason Corcoran The credibility of Moscow's ambition of becoming a global financial centre within five years has been called into question following a summer of systemic shocks to investor confidence and the arrested development of its market institutions.Highly liquid domestic markets, strong economic growth and a position at the heart of a booming region have contributed to the rapid growth of Russia's capital markets over the past decade.The dual government of President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin have a blueprint in place for building Moscow's position as a financial hub. Some institutions, especially the Federal Anti-Monopoly (FAS) commission, have grown in stature due to its recent ...

The commodity correction continues. And it's getting more painful by the minute as big trading houses like Lehman and Merrill Lynch go belly up or are forced into mergers. I think we're seeing a margin call on a global scale. The good news is it should bring incredible opportunities for long-term investors. The bad news is we could see a lot more pain before this is over. A "margin call" is when an investment, bought with borrowed money, decreases in value past a certain point, and an investor either has to put up more money or sell the investment. And we're seeing margin calls as Lehman and others liquidate their trading books. What's more, we're seeing margin calls in oil. Speculators pushing prices down Now, here's where I eat ...

ICO is a maker of specialty resins and concentrates, and provides specialized polymer processing services. The company’s products can be found in manufactured household items, such as toys, household furniture, and trash receptacles; automobile parts; agricultural products, such as fertilizer and water tanks; paints; and metal and fabric coatings. ICO also provides ambient grinding, jet milling, compounding, and ancillary services for resins produced in pellet form and other material forms. The company has 19 factories in 10 countries across the United States, Europe, Asia and the Middle East. It also exports its products to Africa and Asia.

The Texas-based company, which was founded in 1978, has nearly 1,000 employees and competes with firms such as A. Schulman Inc., Polyone Corp. and privately held KRATON Polymers LLC. In an encouraging sign for potential shareholders, the company said on Monday that it would buy back up to $12 million worth of its stock

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Bald Eagle Energy (BEEI) is an exploration stage mining company focused on the acquisition and exploration of mineral resource properties in Canada. The company primarily acquires and explores copper, gold and silver properties. Bald Eagle Energy is also, and possibly more noteworthy to potential investors, engaged in oil exploration. The company is set to develop six new leases on Alaska’s oil-rich North Slope. Bald Eagle’s lease area on the North Slope is estimated to contain about 90 million barrels of crude oil and is one of the North Slope’s least explored areas. Bald Eagle’s leases occupy about 18,000 acres on the North Slope.

What could work in Bald Eagle’s favor is that its area of exploration on the North Slope is relatively small compared to what major oil firms such as ExxonMobil, Occidental Petroleum and Royal Dutch Shell typically look for. Bald Eagle isn’t fighting for leases with these far larger

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