The latest Investing Matters Podcast episode featuring Jeremy Skillington, CEO of Poolbeg Pharma has just been released. Listen here.
The Board denies any suggestion that it preferred the interests of Anavio over COPL's shareholders. Having taken legal advice in relation to its duties, the Board specifically considered the interests of various stakeholders, including COPL's shareholders. Had the Board taken steps to wind down COPL, as some shareholders suggest, it was the Board's business judgment that COPL shareholders would have almost certainly been entirely wiped out. In considering various options, the Board concluded that the value of COPL's assets were insufficient to cover the claims of secured and unsecured creditors which today stand in excess of $135 million as compared with approximately $1 million of cash on hand on a group wide basis (the majority of such liquidity being at COPL's US subsidiary which is subject directly to the security interests of the senior lender). In addition to the $135 million of secured obligations which take priority over equity an orderly formal restructuring proceeding would require a super priority loan of approximately $10 million, putting equity investors of COPL even further "out of the money". As such, the steps taken by the Board (including the recent hiring of an independent engineering consulting firm) were designed to give COPL an opportunity to become more viable over time and to provide shareholders with a potential opportunity to realize some value (over no value in the wind down scenario).
Yes, sorry Medjed, that was a false post just to try and force a reaction to my earlier post asking whether the Canadian listing was actively trading or as it appears, suspended. It was suspended on the same day the finance deal was announced which was about 28th December and it doesn't look like trading restarted.
Statement Re Share Price Movement
London, United Kingdom; Calgary, Canada: January 12, 2024 - Canadian Overseas Petroleum Limited ("COPL" or the "Company") (XOP: CSE) & (COPL: LSE) notes the recent movements in the price of its common shares.
Other than those circumstances disclosed by the Company in recent weeks, the Company is not aware of any operational or corporate reason for the price movement. The equity financing announced by the Company on December 29, 2023 is expected to close next week on the terms that were announced.
That was quick. Pity there was never one when the share price was falling through the floor. Maybe that didn't matter.
No one has made any money here. Everyone has just lost. The m/cap with 1040M shares is £650,000. I'd be surprised if Anavio even go ahead with the nearly £2M placing. Maybe they can amend it to a new lower figure as before.
What I can see is that the patent infringement was issued more than 6 years ago (September 2017) in connection with 2 patents that expired in December 2019 and that the case took more than 5 years to get to court so it was long forgotten about anyway. The management has reviewed the situation and concluded that the patents were unimportant and the whole issue will not affect anything.
The share price was between 1.68p and 1.88p on the day before the 'conclusion of case' RNS which was 15th December 2023. I think that a rerate is in order.
The other problem here, and this is the same for both HE1 and Noble Helium, is that even when either one or both of these explorers say that they have hit Helium the market just does not believe it. Look at the Noble share price, teetering along at an all-time low and more than 20% below the heavily discounted recent placing, and yet they claim to have already all but made a discovery and that both drills were a success.
Give it a break indeed. I actually bought more shares at the placing price (or just above) than all of the management put together. However. unlike the management, I've now sold the bloody lot so they can bungle on and continue to make a complete pig's ear of this and I don't give a sh+t.
Maybe I am just bloody cross that I got lured back in here with the stupidly low placing price. Otherwise, I was gone from here, off to better pastures. I bought back in, but immediately it was more of the same - poor communication, management earning far too high a salary for their skill levels, a continuously falling share price even from a ridiculously low level, etc, etc.
That is what I said. I was expecting the share price to rise pre-spud. It did not. Now it will fall through the floor. So what. I have already said that I have sold the shares I bought at the time of the placing - at a small loss. I previously sold on 25th Sept and did not post here until the placing. I very much doubt I will have any reason to post here again unless the drill is a success and they discover Helium. If not I will be better off out of this.
ATB
Yet another example of the inexperienced management here who know very little about how to communicate to shareholders which is something they are obliged to do as a listed company. Any decent management would have informed the market in advance of the progress with the rig repairs and given a provisional spud date either between Xmas and the New Year or last week. Instead all we get is a 'rig is repaired and spud was 2 days ago' RNS.
I managed to avoid holding any shares here since selling my last ones at 6.59p on 25th Sept - Tai-3 spud date - and watched in horror as the share price plummetted all the way down to 0.25p, at which point I rebought (and stupidly at slightly over the placing price). However with no update over the last 2 weeks the expected share price recovery from the placing price never happened so I have now sold those shares at a small loss. I do not hold during a wildcat drill.
So now either this drill will be a success and find helium, in which case I shall buy back in, or this is heading for a further disaster. All in all the very naive Lorna Blaisse and here equally inexperienced directors have managed to completely trash the share price and m/cap of this company from 6p to 10p down to 0.25p or less. That is some achievement.
And as an example of their lack of interest, the management of HE1 participated in the placing with a total of 7,200,000 shares for a spend of £18,000 between 6 of them, while the management of Noble Helium also participated in their recent placing with 7,292,308 shares between 3 directors for a spend of AUD950,000 (roughly £510,000). I think this just about says it all. The poor management here have completely trashed the share price.
ATB
Don't expect them to have worked all over the Xmas/New Year period just because a few PI's have ended up out of pocket due to the low placing price. Too bad, though now the festivities are over it would be nice for them to get back on the job and to keep the market informed of progress.
I'm assuming that they have all been off for Xmas and the New Year - or I would be a bit worried about them if they haven't had some time off. Now they need to get the rig repaired and tested and ready to drill and let the market know as this is done and then announce a spud date.