HOS Stock

I never said there was anything wrong with it.

Agree.

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Perhaps not a semester, remember, they are getting four years of school compressed into three years due to the one year of sailing and sea projects. VERY heavy course load. At least have a few weeks to explain/educate them on the variances in employment and the cycles the OSV industry has experienced. Not to dissuade them from any industry, but bring them up to speed what the present market is.

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100% Correct

Revision: Teach them during their already required business courses about the ups & downs of the oil & gas/OSV industries.

Don’t bet the farm on those industries. Make the money & seatime while it’s there & walk away to plan B, C, D when it’s not.

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One of the courses while my son was there had an experienced investor (An Alumni) that taught a short course in that area. My son was already a small investor at that time. He got some good insight for plan B,C,&D The best advice I got was from two people. The first was an old bosun recertifying at Piney Point. Around 1974-75,. He was teaching us young AB’s how to splice wire. Took us aside and asked us to look at his hands. He said " Don’t be like me and have to work all your life, save 10 cents of every dollar you make from here on out, you won’t miss it". I took that to heart. I then met/sailed with a tug captain not long after that showed me how to buy stocks and invest kinda/sorta wisely. He retired a multimillionare when things went south with our company. I tell that story to every young mariner that passes through my home or acquaintance. I retired at a much younger age than that Bosun and Tug Captain , forever grateful I met them. It ain’t what you make people, it’s what you keep/protect.

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Sorry to get off track, but it relates to the employees that bought into various stock/profit sharing programs many of theses OSV companies were promoting. Ended up with ZIP. My company also had a similar program, business good, sharing was good, business bad, investment VERY BAD. Good luck to the guy buying .11 in Hos. Feel bad for the many that lost the farm.

Well that’s all folks. Anybody who had & didn’t sell their HOS/HOSS shares will get a write off on it & nothing else. Good luck to future investors who want to throw the dice & invest in the newly issued HOS/HOSS stock that will be on a market soon.

Yep I lost 6 Gs , But i found absolution in this whole thing knowing while I worked there they sent me to GMDSS and ECDIS and Kongsberg DP school, Paid for Travel and Hotels and Per Diem, So its a push. Not to mention all the required GOM safety training. Lesson learned ? I’ve become a little more conscience with my trading decisions .

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The OSV business has never been good for long term investment but there was money to be made trading. The business lacks all the requirements for a stable investment. There is a low barrier for entry and depends on one industry, oil which is cyclical.
Years ago I enjoyed some nice profits from OSV companies, service companies and the drilling contractors but never ever considered them long term investments. IF one believes in the oil business invest in the people that own the oil business not a bunch of contractors.

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I did notice the Oil majors got out of tankers and OSV’s years ago…was there a message there?
Its like the airline business, massive asset investment but income can get turned off in a flash.
Not helped in the last 10 years where banks gave money away to build boats like drunken sailors ( or not as bank can keep spending, sailors bill fold empty thats it)

The message was OPA 90 and removing the ability of a tank vessel owner to limit liability. So the deep pocket vessel owners bailed as there was more at risk than their fleet of vessels. I doubt it had anything to do with stock values. The transition to required double hulls also figured into it, i.e. selling assets while they still had some value.

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Nailed it JD, there was a reason for many companies getting out of black oil around that era. And incorporating the vessels that did still operate in that product to single entities. Did I say that right?

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I’m not sure that led to having each vessel owned by a separate entity, that practice was long established by that time. In my (limited) experience, the opposite happened. I was working as legal intern and later a lawyer at that time. Our biggest client was Reinauer, who was buying a lot of the assets the oil companies were getting rid of. At the same time, they were undertaking a major overhaul foe their corporate structure, that included getting rid of a lot for the single vessel entities. What protection that really offered was dubious anyway, especially when all of the vessels were covered by a single fleet mortgage from one of the parent companies.

Scratching my head on that one. You are the most reliable for answers on this site, but when I look up vessels I’ve sailed on, it says blah blah company and the vessels name. Not the company I worked for. But owns the boat/barge. Whats that about?

I have no idea. The current 46 CFR 10.232 (2014) allows sea service to be attested to by, among others, the owner or operator. The pre-2013 and pre-2008 regs were not specific as to who can sign, but there may have been local policy, the RECs were not centralized then. In any event, the owner may not be able to attest to sea service, e.g. a vessel on a bareboat charter.

I left the industry in 2003. My paperwork is in order I hope with AMO,SIU, and IRS. My mutt doesn’t give a shit.

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Yep, I’m familiar with “bet on the jockey, not the horse” investing philosophy but even the very best jockeys don’t race when the track gets rained out. The oil service industry has too many rained out days for me for any serious long term investments too. That CEO at Hornbeck has had it particularly bad IMO. A buyout from TDW in the mid 90’s & 2 bankruptcies since. There’s way too many profitable, safer, more predictable industries & companies than oilfield service & HOS.

Been there , done that. Won’t do it again. I still think you have to pay your light bill no matter what. Works for me.

Staying positive, staying in the fight & learning from mistakes is highly undervalued IMO. Good for mental health & the best way to take a lose. On one of my first trades I lost all my money but it wasn’t a complete lose because I received a $1,000 lesson on not investing in companies tethering on bankruptcy. For a long time now I’ve been 65-95% down on an IPO stock & if I sold it today I would look at it as a $920 lesson on not buying IPO’s, or at least not IPO’s that come out of the gate into a nose dive. The more expensive the lesson the less likely I am to forget it.

to limit liability and or allow the vessel company to go broke without affecting the parent company

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