A little over a year ago, I wrote about how I expected Master Drilling Master Drilling Group to report strong results. This wasn’t anything clever from my side. Rather it was noting that the group’s key variables were moving in its favour: its order book was growing strongly and utilisation rates on its fleet was rising strongly.
If the mines need to compete among themselves for drilling services, the owner of the fleet wins. This ‘pricing’ lever is another variable that we are only just starting to see play out this cycle. It may have a larger impact going forward at these toppish utilisation rates. Despite all of this, Master Drilling’s share price has only recovered back to more or less the same as its pre-Covid levels.