Oil and gas outfit Touchstone Exploration (TXP:AIM) fell 8.8% to 92.5p despite positive results from a third test on its Royston-1 well in Trinidad.The fall perhaps reflects recent volatility in the oil price and investors expecting more after the company reported very encouraging initial results from the well back in November. They now have to wait until some point in the first quarter of...

Oil explorer Touchstone Exploration (TXP:AIM) gained 16.9% to 137.3p as the first of three planned production tests at an exploration well in Trinidad & Tobago confirmed a light oil discovery.Significantly, the find represented a new pool that had not been encountered in any of the regional offsetting wells.Touchstone shares started 2020 around the 20p mark but a string of drilling successes...

A combination of weak UK consumer confidence, renewed fears about the Evergrande crisis and fretting about the outlook for interest rates put the FTSE 100 on the back foot on Friday.By midday the index was down 0.15% to 7,067.88.Drug maker AstraZeneca (AZN) said its prostate cancer drug in combination with abiraterone developed with MSD, had met the primary goal of a phase 3 trial trial. It...

Touchstone Exploration (TXP:AIM) 101.6pGain to date: 95.4%Original entry point: Buy at 52p, 25 June 2020It has been a volatile few weeks for small cap oil and gas play Touchstone Exploration (TXP:AIM) as it announced mixed news from its Ortoire block in Trinidad & Tobago.However, confirmation that the Cascadura Deep-1 well had yielded a significant natural gas discovery (12 Apr) helped set the...

After an extraordinary year we look back at some of the top performers in different size categories from the heavyweights all the way down to sub £100 million market cap stocks at the bottom of the market and examine what has driven them higher in 2020. We have excluded investment trusts.£4 billion + market capShare price movements in mining companies can be about exposure to the commodities...

Touchstone Exploration (TXP:AIM) 101.4pGain to date: 95%Original entry point: Buy at 52p, 25 June 2020Our faith in small cap oil play Touchstone Exploration (TXP:AIM) continues to be rewarded in stunning fashion as the company announces the latest in a series of positive updates.Touchstone has made another gas discovery on its Ortoire block onshore Trinidad, its third in succession, with the...

So you have opened a share dealing account, familiarised yourself with the mechanics of buying a share and purchased a few companies for your portfolio. The next step on the novice investor's journey is to learn about the numerous factors that drive a share price higher, or lower.From a top down level, these factors include macro-economic events and data points such as gross domestic product...

Touchstone Exploration (TXP:AIM) 73pGain to date: 40.4%Original entry point: Buy at 52p, 25 June 2020Our positive call on Trinidad oil firm Touchstone Exploration (TXP:AIM) has performed strongly with the main catalyst being an updated reserves report on its Cascadura natural gas discovery (20 Jul).The independent report on Cascadura identified proved and probable (2P) reserves net to...

A big natural gas discovery onshore Trinidad has transformed Touchstone Exploration's (TXP:AIM) prospects and investors should buy ahead of multiple incremental catalysts leading up to a step change in group production.This investment is not without risk. Sentiment towards the wider sector is patchy and the shares are already up materially since its Cascadura find was announced.However, we...

London's FTSE 100 added a further 117 points to trade at 7,470.5 on Monday, building on Friday's impressive rally thanks to some of the bigger constituents taking a small step forward including banks, miners and tobacco stocks.Mike Ashley's Sports Direct (SPD) sprinted 13.3% higher to 407.8p after the retailer reported a 58% rise in first half underlying pre-tax profit to £101.8m and insisted...

The UK stock market is experiencing a small rally following a stressful past few days. In mid-morning trade the FTSE 100 was trading 0.7% higher at 7,193.The FTSE 250 index was 1.2% higher at 19,502; and the FTSE AIM All-Share index was up by the same percentage at 1,025.More brave investors are now looking for opportunities to buy on the market dip.Let's now take a look at the best performing...