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Pulse Oil not your 'typical junior', says broker Mackie, which starts coverage

Last updated: 03:01 27 Oct 2017 EDT, First published: 09:45 26 Oct 2017 EDT

Crane
The enhanced oil recovery play could add between 6.5 million and 12 million barrels of light oil reserves

Broker Mackie has begun covering Pulse Oil Corp (CVE:PUL) with a 'speculative buy' rating and C$0.50 target, saying it is not your 'typical junior' oiler.

That's because huge upside could be achieved by the company with very little capital, reckons analyst Bill Newman.

WATCH: Pulse Oil moves to acquire 100% of Bigoray assets in Alberta

The development of the firm's exciting Bigoray assets in Alberta should mark a game-changer for the firm.

Bigoray consists of the Cardium oil pools, the Mannville gas pools, the Pekisko oil pool and the Nisku oil pools.

And recently the firm took 100% of the Nisku-D and E pool acreages via two transactions.

Together these two oil pools are estimated to contain an impressive 26mln barrels of oil initially in place (PIIP), of which around 9.3mln boe (barrels of oil equivalent) has already been recovered using water-flood techniques.

But Pulse plans a miscible flood project to target up to a further 12mln barrels of estimated remaining reserves which would represent an impressive 80% recovery factor.

"...what differentiates this small cap company from others in the current market, is its miscible flood enhanced oil recovery (EOR) project of two Nisku Pinnacle Reefs at Bigoray (100% W.I.)," says Mackie's Newman.

The EOR play has the potential to add between 6.5mln and 12mln barrels of light oil reserves, he says.

This is valued at C$65mln (C$0.74 a share) on the low end with upside to over C$177mln ($2.01 per share), he adds.

That's against a current market capitalisation of the group of around C$4mln, notes the broker.

"As most of the required infrastructure is in place the miscible flood project requires only C$3.0mln of investment per Nisku Reef providing massive upside without the risk and significant cost of an extensive horizontal drilling program," it adds.

Mackie also notes that Pulse's management have 'skin in the game' with Garth Johnson, the chief executive and Drew Cadenhead, president and chief operating officer, having a combined investment of C$1.3mln in Pulse at an average cost of around $0.11 per share holding, around 14% of the outstanding shares, while taking no salary for the last two years.

"The significant level of ownership aligns the interest of management with shareholders."

The analyst notes that at the current market price , Pulse currently trades at a steep discount to the broker's core NAV (net asset value) estimate of C$0.23per fully diluted share, excluding the Nisku miscible flood.

That net asset value rises to C$0.75 per fully diluted share when the broker includes its conservative valuation for the flood.

Pulse Oil shares added 20% on Thursday to C$0.12.

Pulse Oil planning for an enhanced recovery program at flagship Bigoray

Pulse Oil (CVE:PUL) President Drew Cadenhead and CEO Garth Johnson sat down with Steve Darling from Proactive Investors to talk about the work that was done this winter on their projects including their flagship Bigoray and how this set up the big works schedule for this summer. Cadenhead...

on 04/12/2019