Oil price, Aminex, Rose, VOG, Talon, DGO And finally…
WTI $57.91 -$3.51, Brent $67.76 -$3.23, Diff -$9.85 +28c, NG $2.58 +4c
Oil price
Oil came down with a bump yesterday, the supply shortages are forgotten and the ramping up of the war of words on the US/Sino trade situation intensified with a consequent hit to all markets. Equities and commodities alike took a bath made worse by the Markit index numbers and the Eurozone manufacturing index reading. If you add to that the continued build in oil inventories then traders and money managers have taken money off the table, this morning some of them appear to be closing that short trade…
Aminex has announced that CEO Jay Bhattacherjee is stepping down with immediate effect for health reasons. Tom Mackay takes over as interim CEO and a search is under way for a full time CEO. I wish Jay all the very best for a full and rapid recovery.
Rose has announced this morning that the subscription of £300,000 has completed and this confirms that Colin Harrington has joined the company as Executive Chairman. This places Rose, finally, in a much stronger position to deliver value from existing assets and may see others being acquired.
As if the update from VOG seemed only a few days ago today we have finals for 2018, a year that to be frank is one to forget. But, cost cutting is under way and ENEO signed a new 3 year binding term sheet with GDC for gas for the Logbaba power station in December.
Since the year end there have been management changes as Kevin Foo departed and Roger Kennedy took over as executive Chairman and further cost cutting. Also the balance sheet was repaired with a $17.7m raise and with Q1 gas production up 127% and new customers still being brought on the outlook for VOG is significantly brighter. The final point is that to keep all this positive momentum going they need to have deliverable and visible evidence of payment, a rising receivables number will not butter any parsnips.
Talon Petroleum
I met this week with Matt Worner, Managing Director of Talon Petroleum which while it has an ASX quote and a modest market cap could easily become a much more major league player over here and should be one for the notebook. The Talon story is based around investment in the North Sea which it believes is right in terms of timing and risk and where it can make a meaningful impact from its current portfolio.
That current portfolio is comprised of the acquisition of Encounter Oil and which brought 100% of two exploration licences in the Skymoos and Rocket prospects with 107mmbo and 27mmbo estimated prospective resources respectively. Perhaps more importantly, Encounter which had been formed by members of the team that brought you Encore (acquired by Premier for £221m in 2011) and brings with it experienced North Sea players Graham Doré and Paul Young. In addition Talon has participated in the 31st and 32nd Government bid rounds where it hopes to add to the existing portfolio.
Talon have a farm-out process under way at both Rocket and Skymoos which it hope can be sorted by the end of this year or beginning of next after which work can get underway. It also has a 10% interest in Curlew-A, an historic Shell find through farm-in to operator Corallian and where an appraisal well is expected to be drilled Q4 of this year.
As I said, Talon is one for the notebook and it may pop-up in a number of places and with other companies we know. The ASX quote is a pain but one can’t rule out them getting a quote over here at some time in the future.
As per my Twitter comment I have been asked to see if there are any blog readers who would like to meet DGO who are in town in the last week of June, message me if you would like an invitation.
And finally…
The Jam Tarts take on Celtic tomorrow in the Scottish Cup Final leaving after that just the two European cup finals before the summer break.
The showpiece of the F1 season is the Monaco GP, in practice today the Mercs are still the fastest even though the Ferrari’s were expected to be better here.
It is the semi final weekend in rugby union with Sarries taking on the cherry and whites whilst the Chiefs face the Saints.
And lots of warm-up games ahead of the cricket World Cup which starts next week.
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