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by Stockwatch Business Reporter

West Texas Intermediate crude for December delivery, the benchmark in North America, lost $1.25 to $77.40 on the New York Merc, while Brent for December, the international benchmark, lost $1.05 to $82.34 (all figures in this para U.S.). Western Canadian Select, Canada's heavy oil benchmark, traded at a discount of $16.90 to WTI ($60.50), up from a discount of $17.20. Natural gas for December, the international benchmark, lost 15.7 cents to $4.25. The TSX energy index lost 3.50 points to close at 259.25.

John Wright's Lightstream Resources Ltd. (LTS) reached an intraday high of $3.26 before reversing and closing at $2.75, down 18 cents, on 6.84 million shares. It has arranged a 19-million-share buyback, bowing to wishes that many investors expressed during a conference call on Oct. 31, the day it released disappointing third quarter results. Lightstream has 200 million shares outstanding. Investors who took part in the hour-and-a-half-long conference call had several suggestions, expressed with varying degrees of testiness, to get the share price back up to its June level above $9. A common proposal was that the company cut its spending (including its generous dividend, which yields 17.4 per cent) so it could buy back shares and/or pay down its $1.56-billion debt. President and chief executive officer Wright said he did not see a share buyback as the best use of capital. This morning, however, Lightstream renewed its normal course issuer bid (NCIB). This does not necessarily mean anything -- the company did not buy any shares under its previous NCIB -- but this time may be different because Lightstream has also arranged an issuer repurchase plan with a broker, allowing for buybacks even when the company is in a trading blackout. Mr. Wright said during the conference call that Lightstream is often in non-routine blackouts because it is "constantly" in discussions about potential deals. The discussions rarely lead anywhere, but because Lightstream is treated as an insider when it buys back shares, doing so during the discussions could violate insider trading rules. The new broker deal changes that. Investors seem skeptical that anything will change. Insiders, however, are bullish. From Nov. 4 to 7, six of them bought 506,000 shares at an average price of $2.60. Mr. Wright bought 200,000 of those and boosted his shareholdings to 5.8 million.

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