Matt Badiali with an AK-47 in Iraq...

Matt Badiali with an AK-47 in Iraq... Why Kurdistan oil production is about to soar... How to join us in Singapore... Facebook's crazy day...

 S&A Resource Report editor Matt Badiali is back on U.S. soil.

Matt recently returned from a trip to Kurdistan – a region that includes northern Iraq, Syria, eastern Turkey, and Iran – to investigate what he considers some of the most promising oil companies in the world.

As you can imagine, it's not the safest place to visit today... Matt's friends thought he had lost his mind. He had to be accompanied by multiple armed security guards at all times. His bags were scanned at an outside facility before he was even able to check into his hotel.

 I spoke with Matt on the phone today. He's home safe... And he saw lots of potential investment opportunities while he was out there. More on that in a moment...

 While Matt was traveling, he e-mailed daily updates to a select group of people. I've excerpted one of our favorite pieces for today's Digest...

The man in the passenger seat lifted up the black-and-white checkered scarf by his leg. Under it was an AK-47 with a folding stock. The driver had an identical one. That's when I knew this wasn't going to be a typical trip out to look at rocks.

Taking a two-hour drive up into the mountains to the north of the city of Erbil is an experience. It takes a two-car convoy, with two drivers and two armed guards. We passed several checkpoints. One had an armored personnel carrier with what looked like anti-aircraft guns on the roof... and a gunner was sitting behind them.

This was the one part of my trip to Erbil, Iraq that was non-negotiable for me. I needed to get out to examine the rocks. I wanted to look at how the drilling rigs were set up and hopefully see oil seep from the earth. As I found out... it's not that easy.

We headed out of the city around 2 p.m., after my morning meetings. It was a pleasant drive, as long as guns and armed guards don't make you nervous. The ride itself was fine. The only hiccup was an occasional checkpoint, flock of sheep crossing the road, and once, a solitary cow standing in our way.

Our Toyota Land Cruisers climbed over a low ridge and down into a long valley. The desert here is dotted with small trees and flocks of sheep. It looked like the Colorado/Utah border. Rock layers in the mountains looked like oversized piles of books that slid over onto their sides.

Like the city, the valley to the north was a hotbed of construction. Houses and compounds in various stages of work were going up all over. A larger construction project was underway as well, possibly a new highway or pipeline.

Finally, we began to climb up a steep mountainside on the far side of the valley. The views were spectacular. However, it was the cliff side that I wanted to see. The rocks were exactly as advertised. They were a classically folded sequence of marine rocks... Textbook oilfields exposed on the surface.

We stopped at the top of the mountain to take pictures, but I quickly ducked out to go look at the thick limestone exposed in the road cut. Then, we packed back into the trucks for the trip back to the hotel.

 Matt is currently preparing a presentation outlining five companies operating in Kurdistan that he believes are about to make huge discoveries.

He's bullish on the region because by the end of this year, a pipeline will be completed and operating that sends Iraqi Kurdistan oil to Turkey. It will transport 300,000 barrels a day. By 2014, Matt says this pipeline will deliver 1 million barrels of Kurdistan oil to Turkey... And by 2019, there will be a second pipeline – together, they'll transport 2 million barrels of oil daily.

 To put those numbers in perspective, Oklahoma produces 300,000 barrels daily. By 2015, Kurdistan's oil exports will be equal to the oil production of Alaska, California, and Nevada combined. By 2019, its exports will be equal to 27% of U.S. daily production.

 Kurdistan isn't a big place. It's just 74,000 square miles. It would be the 18th-largest state in the U.S., roughly the size of Washington or South Dakota.

But this region is still surprising everyone with its potential. The $25 billion oil producer Marathon Oil just announced a new discovery named Mirawa about 40 miles north of Erbil. The first well flowed 11,000 barrels of oil per day, 1,700 barrels of condensate per day, and 72 million cubic feet of natural gas.

It's a huge discovery.

 Matt believes we'll see oil giants like ExxonMobil, Chevron, and China's state-run Sinopec buying Kurdistan's junior exploration companies in the next 12-24 months.

Once the first takeover is complete, Matt says we'll see an avalanche of activity. That's why it's important to act on this information quickly.

He will release the names of his five favorite companies operating in Kurdistan at our S&A Alliance meeting next month. This is the annual meeting we hold for our very best subscribers. (The S&A Alliance is our highest-tiered subscription. It grants subscribers access to everything we publish – minus Phase 1 Investor – for life.)

 This year's meeting is taking place on November 18 in Singapore. Each year, we ask our top analysts to present new, never-before-published ideas at the meeting. We also invite esteemed outside speakers to share their top ideas and opportunities.

If you're an Alliance member and you'd like to attend, you must act quickly. Registration closes Friday, November 1 at midnight. You can learn more by clicking here.

 If you'd like to become an Alliance member, and join us in Singapore, you can call our sales team at (888) 863-9356. They will happily process your order and hold a spot for you at the conference.

I hope to see you next month in Singapore.

 And if you'd like to read more from Matt's travels in Kurdistan, our free news aggregator website The Daily Crux has been posting Matt's notes. You can access them for free right here.

 New 52-week highs (as of 10/30/12): American Financial Group (AFG), BP (BP), Energy Transfer Partners (ETP), Integrated Device Technology (IDTI), Longleaf Partners Fund (LLPFX), and RPM International (RPM).

 You can't please everyone all the time... Send your thoughts to feedback@stansberryresearch.com.

 "Not commenting on the most unusual action of Facebook yesterday left me very unfulfilled with your non-comments. All that on AAPL and not a word on FB." – Anonymous

Goldsmith comment: I'm not sure what's unusual about a company announcing solid earnings and the stock moving higher...

Revenue rose 60% from a year ago to pass $2 billion for the first time. The company has also been successful in mobile advertising, which was responsible for 49% of its advertising revenue.

Facebook earned $425 million for the quarter, up from a loss of $59 million in the year ago period.

The stock was up 15% in after-market hours. But it has moved all over the place today, down as much as 5% and up as much as 6%.

Shares initially sold off after Chief Financial Officer David Ebersman said the company doesn't expect much more growth in mobile advertising.

There's your important summary of the daily movement of a security. Remember, in the short term, the market is a "voting machine," gauging how investors feel about a stock. In the long term, it's a "weighing machine," revealing its true value.

Regards,

Sean Goldsmith
Miami Beach, Florida
October 31, 2013

The next leg higher on our favorite European trade is taking shape…

In July, we told you about a great way to make money off a recovery in Europe... Since then, the trade is showing a 30% profit.

In today's Digest Premium, we explain that this trade could soon explode higher...

To subscribe to Digest Premium and receive a free hardback copy of Jim Rogers' latest book, click here.

The next leg higher on our favorite European trade is taking shape…

 In the July 9 Digest Premium, I (Porter) shared my favorite way to profit from the European crisis...

I recommended going long Greece and shorting France...

You can hold a basket of Greek stocks with the Global X FTSE Greece 20 Fund (GREK) and short French stocks with the iShares France Fund (EWQ)...

I like this trade because everybody already knows Greece is broke. As a result, everything bad has already happened in Greece... It's priced in.

Interest rates have already soared. (One-year interest rates hit 1,000% last year. That's not a typo.) Stocks have already crashed. It looks like Greece is at a blood-in-the-streets bottom. (But we can't be certain. Things can always get worse.)

France, on the other hand, is still expensive. It's trading like a free-market country, when it's actually a socialist paradise. And they always end the same way: bankrupt.

 Since then, GREK is up more than 48%. The EWQ is up 18%. So if you followed my advice, you've made 30% in a little more than three months.

 And sentiment is improving in Greece. JPMorgan analyst Francesco Conte, who manages the investment bank's $2.8 billion European Small-Cap Fund, told Bloomberg...

The outlook for the country has completely changed. I'm very overweight Greece because I find very, very good opportunities, very well-run companies and very cheap valuations. Greece is only just emerging from the crisis. Because they've cut their cost bases so low, the profitability growth is going to be enormous if we get positive GDP growth.

 Yield on 10-year Greek debt is down to 8.31% from a peak of 33.7% in March 2012.

And from the beginning of the year through October 28, flows into Greek equity funds increased 129% (compared with 15% growth for Europe as a whole). In total, investors have poured $179 million into Greek stocks this year.

 In tomorrow's Digest Premium, we'll tell you about a major change coming for Greek equities that will attract a whole new class of investor...

– Porter Stansberry with Sean Goldsmith

The next leg higher on our favorite European trade is taking shape…

In July, we told you about a great way to make money off a recovery in Europe... Since then, the trade is showing a 30% profit.

In today's Digest Premium, we explain that this trade could soon explode higher...

To continue reading, scroll down or click here.

 


Stansberry & Associates Top 10 Open Recommendations
(Top 10 highest-returning open positions across all S&A portfolios)


As of 10/30/2013

 

Stock Symbol Buy Date Return Publication Editor
Rite Aid 8.5% 767754BU7 02/06/09 683.6% True Income Williams
Prestige Brands PBH 05/13/09 402.7% Extreme Value Ferris
Enterprise EPD 10/15/08 245.3% The 12% Letter Dyson
Constellation Brands STZ 06/02/11 204.6% Extreme Value Ferris
Abbott Labs ABT 05/20/11 191.4% The 12% Letter Ferris
Altria MO 11/19/08 178.8% The 12% Letter Dyson
Ultra Health Care RXL 03/17/11 178.3% True Wealth Sjuggerud
McDonald's MCD 11/28/06 168.5% The 12% Letter Dyson
Hershey HSY 12/06/07 166.0% SIA Stansberry
GenMark Diagnostics GNMK 08/04/11 154.4% Phase 1 Curzio

Please note: Securities appearing in the Top 10 are not necessarily recommended buys at current prices. The list reflects the best-performing positions currently in the model portfolio of any S&A publication. The buy date reflects when the editor recommended the investment in the listed publication, and the return shows its performance since that date. To learn if a security is still a recommended buy today, you must be a subscriber to that publication and refer to the most recent portfolio.

Top 10 Totals
1 True Income Williams
2 Extreme Value Ferris
3 The 12% Letter Dyson
1 The 12% Letter Ferris
1 True Wealth Sjuggerud
1 SIA Stansberry
1 Phase 1 Curzio


Stansberry & Associates Hall of Fame
(Top 10 all-time, highest-returning closed positions across all S&A portfolios)

Investment Sym Holding Period Gain Publication Editor
Seabridge Gold SA 4 years, 73 days 995% Sjug Conf. Sjuggerud
ATAC Resources ATC 313 days 597% Phase 1 Badiali
JDS Uniphase JDSU 1 year, 266 days 592% SIA Stansberry
Silver Wheaton SLW 1 year, 185 days 345% Resource Rpt Badiali
Jinshan Gold Mines JIN 290 days 339% Resource Rpt Badiali
Medis Tech MDTL 4 years, 110 days 333% Diligence Ferris
ID Biomedical IDBE 5 years, 38 days 331% Diligence Lashmet
Northern Dynasty NAK 1 year, 343 days 322% Resource Rpt Badiali
Texas Instr. TXN 270 days 301% SIA Stansberry
MS63 Saint-Gaudens   5 years, 242 days 273% True Wealth Sjuggerud
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