Kingpin investors raise energy stakes - Triangle Business Journal:

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A bevy of high-profile asset managers and hedge fund gurus returned to buyinh mode after taking financial lumps in the second half of 2008 when the valuwe of energy company shares tankedf along with the price of oil andnatural gas. Prominenrt investors such as all-star asset manager Paul Tudor energymaverick T. Boone Pickens and hedg fund investor George Soros dipped their toes in the energ y pool once again and grabbed multiple stakess inHouston companies, according to regulatoryu statements filed this month. Jones, who oversees Tudoe Investment Corp.
, found bargains in 10 Houston-basesd energy companies or major players with a significanrt presence inthe region, and also took a new position in Waster Management Inc., still a big favoritd of Microsoft Corp. founder Bill Gates. Pickens, who has spent the past 12 months lobbying for his plan to help the countrh kick the importedoil habit, still knows a fossil-fuelk bargain when he sees one. The Texaws oil maven took new positions in a wide rangre of energy companieswith beaten-dowb stock prices at the end of 2008, a year that the bellwetheer Philadelphia Oil Service Index dipped nearly 60 Pickens dabbled in services players such as Schlumberger Ltd. and Halliburtobn Co.
, natural gas shale producer ChesapeakeEnergyt Corp. and high-profile exploration and production companyu AnadarkoPetroleum Corp. Soros took even bigget bites inthe process, gaining new positions in services players Naborws Industries Ltd. and Weatherford Internationaol Inc. — after selling off his Schlumbergerfstake — while adding to his position in . Besides his substantiapl switchinto Weatherford, Soros made another big move in late Apripl involving a Houston-based company by adding 3 million more sharea of Plains Exploration and Production Co., boosting his stake to nearly 6.5 million shares.
Energy analystsa and asset investment manager s who follow these movers and shakers say that aftet energy stock prices kept climbing in 2007 towar d lofty highsin mid-2008, it’s been a whilew since the notion of value investing could be applied to the “Timing is everything,” says Eddiew Allen, senior partner with Eagle Global Advisors LLC. “There may have been an over-reactiom in the fall with the sell-off of oil stocks. There’s stilo a lot of volatility to deal but these investors did well in anticipatinyg therise (in oil prices) that we’ve seen so far this from the mid-$30s to $60.
” Allenn says that value investors are still playing a bit of a waitin g game. He notes that stock prices are natural gas has notfollowefd oil’s recovery in 2009, and there are concernas that prices could stay depressed as inventories There is also more speculation, he adds, abour possible consolidation as mid-cap exploration and production companies eye the pickings among smaller competitors. Dan Pickering, co-president and head of researcuat Tudor, Pickering, Holt Co. Securities Inc., says Pickens, Sorox and Tudor might have even added more shares during the quartefr if energy stocks had not rallier and moved a bit higherthan expected.
“Thed market took off so strongly in the firstr quarter that investors took a pausse waiting for a pullback that never They might have wanted more but the stocks got away a littl bit on the Pickering says. All things energy was the hottest investmentf gamein town. Says Pickering: “Thde overall theme here is that investorss became reengagedin energy, which dramatically out-performede the rest of the market in the first as people were just less terrifiedc about the state of the world The energy resurgence partt had some notable no-shows. While Pickens and Soros were pickingnew favorites, otherf big-name investors were still cleaningh house. Warren Buffett sold 13.
7 million ConocoPhillips shares in the quarter to reducer his stake to a stillsizablee 71.2 million shares. Buffet concedef to shareholders of his BerkshireHathaway Inc. asser management firm that his huge investment in ConocoPhillips last year when oil prices peakedat $147 a barrel was a mistake.