Eagle & Beagle: Tulsa energy companies win and lose

Syntroleum Corp., a Tulsa-based firm that creates synthetic fuels out of animal grease and fats, finished the week with an 11.3 percent gain. It was the stock's best week since February.

The less impressive part of that is that SYNM gained just 7 cents to close at 71 cents, a mere 14 cents off its 52-week low.

Nasdaq notified the company this week that the stock's price must trade above $1 a share for 10 straight days within the next six months or it could be removed from the exchange.

At least it's moving in the right direction.

Beagle

We're frankly getting a little worried about this beagle.

In the past three months, Tulsa-based Apco Oil & Gas International Inc. shares have lost 75 percent of their value.

Last week, the trend continued with the stock dropping 10 percent to $19.11, a new 52-week low. By comparison, the 52-week high was north of $92.

Long-term investors (and majority owner WPX Energy) must be cringing. Much of the concern is political, arising after Argentina's president seized the country's biggest energy company from a Spanish firm earlier this year.

Although officials from Apco, which has major operations in Argentina, have sought to calm investors, it clearly hasn't worked.

Eagle & Beagle is a weekly look at the state's high-performing (eagle) or low-performing (beagle) stocks by Business Writer Don Mecoy.