Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar ($PRE.to, Derwick Associates)

This week I noticed this curious securities filing from US Oil Sands Inc from 2012. It includes the following tidbit:

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There’s nothing unusual about these two investment companies buying shares of an oil company. Ice Rose Holdings is controlled by Serafino Iacono, co-chairman of Pacific Rubiales Energy Corp., ID Introduction Ltd. is controlled by Jose Francisco Arata, as shown here. Arata is president of Pacific Rubiales. Oil guys, buying shares in an oil company.

What caught my eye was the address of Arata’s company. Torre Kyra PH-1, where have I heard that address before? That’s right: Derwick Associates. Having spent too many hours studying both Pacific Rubiales and Derwick Associates, without the vaguest sense that they overlapped*, I had to wipe up the shrapnel from my exploding head.

A Pacific Rubiales executive using Derwick’s address in 2012. That would have been pretty interesting.

But as I always like to do, I gave Pacific Rubiales a chance to comment. And in a rare departure, the company responded. A gracious note, too (even though they apparently have me confused with another blogger). Here’s what they say:

As to Derwick Associates, Mr. Arata does not know the company or the people running it and has no relationship with that company.  The address in question was the address in Caracas for companies that Mr. Arata worked for, but the office was sold back in 2009 and has not been used by Mr. Arata since. The filing from 2012 is simply an error, resulting from a failure on our part to update ID Introduction’s corporate address when helping Mr. Arata file the notice of private placement you read.  The proper corporate address is actually in Panama.

Thanks for the heads’ up on this, as we are now checking all our filings to make sure that ID Introduction’s proper address is reflected in all current filings.

So now on to another person using the address of Torre Kyra, PH-1. Mr. Alvarado, I’d love to give you a chance to comment, too, but I can’t find any contact info. Be in touch, let me know how to reach you.

* Unless you count that they both have dealings with David Osio’s financial institutions. But who doesn’t, right?