Gulf Keystone fears for its future viability amid Kurdistan crude suspension

Cuts 55% expat jobs, reviewing further cuts

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First-half production and sales hit by Kurdistan export suspension

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Shares down around 8%

Aug 31 (Reuters) -

Gulf Keystone Petroleum flagged doubts on Thursday about its ability to continue as a going concern after announcing it had cut 55% of its expatriate jobs to slash costs amid the suspension of Kurdistan crude exports.

Shares in the oil producer, which focuses on Iraqi Kurdistan, were down about 8% at 1014 GMT.

The London-listed company said it was reviewing further job cuts following a hit to production and sales after the closure of the Iraq-Turkey Pipeline in March.

Last week Turkish ministers met the head of Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdistan regional government (KRG) for talks, including on oil exports, but neither said if a deal had been reached to resume crude flows through Turkey.

"While no official timeline has been announced, we continue to believe that the suspension of exports will be temporary and that the KRG will resume oil sales payments in due course," CEO Jon Harris said in a statement.

Turkey stopped the oil flows in March after losing a long-standing arbitration case brought by Iraq.

"Given the current uncertainty over the timing of the pipeline reopening ...the Directors have therefore concluded that a material uncertainty exists which may cast significant doubt on the group's ability to continue as a going concern," the company said.

The company however said it has "reasonable expectation" that the group has enough resources to operate for the next 12 months.

"At current realised prices... we are able to cover our current estimated H2 2023 monthly net capex, operating costs and other G&A (general and administrative) run rate of about $6 million," Harris added.

Gulf Keystone said it had started local sales and partially resumed production in July and it was pursuing further increases in local sales for Shaikan Field crude.

"To protect its balance sheet, the business moved quickly to establish new sales channels into the local market," analysts at Peel Hunt said in a note.

The suspension has also halted repayments via crude cargoes of $6 billion owed to energy traders including Vitol and Petraco by KRG.

Genel Energy, which also operates in the region, suspended dividend payments this month. (Reporting by Anchal Rana and Yadarisa Shabong in Bengaluru; Editing by Savio D'Souza, Sherry Jacob-Phillips, Philippa Fletcher and Susan Fenton)