Sometimes by the time an important investing trend hits the NY Times the story is close to over, but I don’t think that’s true here. There’s a good story on the drillship shortage in the NY Times today, worth a read if you want to understand the demand picture a little better — or the challenges of building and operating these vessels.
Of course, Transocean gets the top mention — but Seadrill is also noted in the article, and a photo of one of their Drillships, the West Polaris, makes the first page. They also noted that Seadrill ordered this rig for about $450 million — just a nice reminder of the power of being early, when they agreed to sell it to Ship Finance Limited the sale price was about $850 million, closer to the market value but also a nice near-double on that Seadrill investment (even if you ignore the millions that Seadrill will soon be making operating the ship, over and above their lease payments to Ship Finance).
So … nothing really new, but maybe a few more folks will get interested in this story now that Bush has asked for more offshore drilling — good luck getting the rigs even if new exploration is approved.
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