Member Info for belgrano

I see your view bigpunt, however you do raise another with DD, which I take as due diligence.
Makes me wonder if this is seriously lacking here, especially from a team that claim its not their first rodeo.
Factual examples are..
Poor RNS's leading to correction later that day ( 20,000 tons).
Poor accounting ..leading to corrective RNS when errors found.
Did a major USA launch in supposed partnership with NPF, only to get stumped at the first fence as they had failed to predict/ allow or even arrange a suitable USA distribution partner.
Influencers as was pointed out by investors on this forum probably far from ideal, which subsequently proved correct.
Massive over production of product..may lead to large wastage when sell by date runs out.. Also coupled with much higher warehouse storage space and costs than required, due to that manufacturing, when all that was required was space the size of my large workshop.
Total lack of information sharing with investors while drawing a top 2% salary, indeed other companies don't seem to make such a huge tirade of errors which waste investors money at every step.
Now we hear through the grapevine that the reason 1.2M was taken off the table (yeah right), was to go with another much larger company, only to hear nearly a year later that they want a company with more products... Another excuse which fits.
Guess I'm going to be insulted again for making these points, but they do add up to some pretty bad DD from our small team which has cost investors here thousands and continue to do so.

Many company acquisitions fail after initially appearing a cracking buy. Often this is when the small details are examined it reveals larger debts or personal financial obligations, or even contractual clauses which turn it from a shinning white light into a poison pill.
Some more in the know than others believed that "its in the bag", last November. Clearly right now its not. However had it been a straightforward purchase we should have heard more by now.
This company has now a proven history, of when there is no news its not good news.
When things were going well we were updated practically every week.
what's changed, and why no investor information.

Our company does have reserves of cash, plus a relatively small payroll. So short term no real issue. Planned oil expansion could continue and well as a great opportunity for any required repairs to our facilities.
Think we have to view the bigger picture here as when the green light comes on , it could signify a whole new dawn for our company.
I would actually start building a storage tank 5 times as big as they currently have right now.
Lead time would not be large, and you only have to fill it once and its paid for itself.
Reason is there have often been hiccups along the way, its a long export pipe through different controlled zones so bound to be things in the future as well. That way production can always continue.

The actual good news is the amount of money they are loosing due to failure to fully agree and I suspect based on corruption and tribal differences.
850M in lost crude sales.
A great deal of money owed to the oil exploration and extraction companies. Clear breaches of contract.
KRG employees that have not been paid.
Payments from Baghdad late.
Low pipeline flow rates make penalty payments due to Turkey.
Turkish crude export port practically shut down.
Oil tankers huge demurrage costs.
Diss- satisfied crude oil customers.
Those costs are not going away and will only increase so agreement is in most peoples interest Except those doing the shady deals who suddenly see the writing on the wall and dont like it.
Why I'm hopeful of agreement soon.

Seems we certainly do have some mixed messages currently and at least one party is deliberately holding up the crude flows restarting, so far I've heard.
1.Crude pipeline within Kurdistan has been light oil flushed so could restart quickly.
2. Crude oil producers being told to prepare for start up, (over a week ago)
3.Agreement between Erbil and Badgdad nearly 4 weeks ago.
4.Excuses that maint work in now taking place on the Turkish side of the pipeline.
5.Crude ships that were booked being given other cargoes elsewhere.
6. Talk that hard liners in Bagdad with Iranian influence had gone back on the deal, and not given instruction to start crude.
7. Turkey unhappy with loosing the case doesn't want to pay, nearly a billion fine.
8.Turkey trying to blackmail crude restarting by linking it to other long standing court cases.
9.Turkey asking for talks...but have they happened and what was the result. Bit poor if ignored.
10.Just being used as an excuse to hold oil companies to ransom and demand worse contract terms.

Well I believe first 5 are correct, unsure about the next 5 , unless anyone actually knows any different.
Appreciate views.

time is most certainly money for the big crude carriers, recall some of the penalties for delay were in excess of 10k/hr in demurrage so used to prioritise their time on the jetty, even shunting smaller cargoes if req.
expect there were some hefty costs associated with current delays.
There is a surprising lack of information currently as to exactly why exports are being delayed and whats actually being done by whom to resolve the issues. They were quick enough to have a big back slapping party weeks ago , saying "all is agreed", " we will restart exports this week", and then nothing. Plenty of rumour but nothing concrete. Seems the same officials need to get off their tea drinking arriss and go sort it out, and do what they are paid handsomely to do.

Excellent news Machersman, as the lighter oil which acts as a fluxant will keep the line available for much faster commissioning.
Found this older article about crude oil prices and where we are likely to see them in the future and what each oil producing country requires per barrel to balance the books. Clearly prices are going up.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2023-04-12/recession-odds-inflation-fears-jump-as-us-saudi-oil-pact-breaks-down?re_source=boa_mustread&leadSource=uverify%20wall

hi machersman, do you know which company actually has the oil flowing and whether its exporting or being used as an interior transport route for one of their teapots. either way its good news as the crude is flowing which was one of my concerns.

Certainly don't want a slanging match over another company, however lets look again at Octibac, and use the comments Toyin has very kindly shared below,

Optibac latest filing shows turnover of £12.6m, with cost of sales of £5.4m, leaving a gross profit of £7.1m, less admin expenses of £6.8m, leaving an operating profit of £303k.
So in summary you think it's a good idea for SA to go and raise approx £12.3m and focus 90% of his efforts, on one strand, of one pillar, to achieve £300k profit?

We should look at the bigger picture here and not the first years results, which shows that a major advertising and sales campaign has really bought this company decent sales numbers albeit for 300k profit. However a biggie being missed is the huge "cost of sales" and "admin expenses" in the main is probably the one off, in getting the name known and customer base subscribing and buying the product. Next year could easily be 5m plus in profit, as a lot of those costs were one off, unless they want to do a sort of half way house and spend another slice on advertising.

Had our company done similar especially with the 80% plus subscriber retention rate we would have already been off to the races, and the share price would not have been languishing and paralysed by lack of any positive news. Its well worth food for thought.
Best regards,
Bel.

I certainly don't believe its a time for shaking heads with despair. I actually believe we will see a much brighter future for Kurdistan oilers and companies. There is a significant point which is being overlooked, and that is companies like ours took the risk and drilled on virgin ground. They did not bid on existing known oilfield where you just have to develop it using proven methods like they did in the south.
This is fundamental, and they will want all the current oil producers on board and producing as much as possible, and incentivise them to do so by simply grandfathering existing contracts with new ones falling under probably altered SOMO directorship.
This way everyone wins.

Some small contracts signed between the now SOMO and those that buy the crude oil, bet these are forward purchasing agreements, at a special arranged price that they've been doing. Those that think they are getting cheap crude plus some pre arranged "special" payments are clearly not going to be happy. The KRG crude oil gravy train is over for the embezzlers.

Poultry.. laughing to myself.. with predictive text, oops HFO waste and crude oil producers.

I think we do have to be realistic here. This new chapter in Kurdistan crude oil production will hopefully last a long time. We have to accept that things might not be quite as rosy as per original contract but we have seen that with the lower Kurdistan oil blend which does contain some residues and hog, which is essentially refinery waste being used to bulk out the cerise while being in effect subsidised by the crude poultry producers like ourselves. Even with the krg prices our company can certainly turn a very healthy profit indeed.

Extracted from the kindly posted article from reuters below. Four sources told Reuters....That's excellent news as it irons out possibility of just one person spreading incorrect news. Technical issues must be financial as well as discussing what they are going to do to physically get the crude moving again. Falls in line with reports asking the oil producers to prepare for oil exportation again and start up. Hopefully that essential maintenance on the Turkish side of the pipeline has been completed so higher throughputs can be achieved once settled out.

April 17 (Reuters) - Iraq’s federal government and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) have ironed out technical issues essential to resuming northern oil exports from the Turkish port of Ceyhan to international markets, four sources told Reuters on Monday.

Hi Theoryman,
Its good to see truthful honest debate on this board, especially and I'm trying not to get carried away things could really herald a great new future for our company where we have never been before. Its because we have all come through the meat grinder with this company, and have all become acutely aware just how corrupt that region of the world is, indeed our own board at the times of first exploration were clearly just as bad...
One over self awarding (finance) ex board member even made UK chancellor...talk about wolf in the henhouse....Before being found out for not one but several "irregularities", and sacked on the spot by a premier who realised he was toxic.
However as the regions finances which are all oil based become more transparent, so the fortune of our company will grow. I certainly learnt some pretty hard lessons from the past and know many other investors here also in the same boat, so also schooled in the playground of hard knocks. I believe its really critical that all investors and traders here post openly and freely to share whatever information we can glean and work together.
One clear example is todays price action, because the news from the article yesterday is not mainstream Bloomberg yet, so participants here might decide to take advantage for trading or investment, or even closing short positions...and best of luck to them.

Want to be real but also realistic so expecting delays, would be pleased to see some oil flowing later this week even if not ours.
Also I don't expect crude payments to be any faster, hopefully to get pleasant surprise. Just got to take things one small step at a time. We have to remember that SOMO now has ultimate control , and want a decent consolidation period now without hiccups.
Its actually not in anyone's interest to rock the boat for a while now, however I can see a point when SOMO greedy eyes may look at our contracts and think we are getting too much return. Got to bear in mind oil contracts in Iraqi known fields are like service contracts where the oil companies get just a few dollars per barrel extracted. these where hotly contested and bid on, and I know investors here took all the exploration risk, however we have yet no guarantees that existing contracts with the KRG will be grandfathered. First thing they will say is "we are getting more for our crude so need to tweak this or that", while waving that contract sword over our heads. So we must continue to be very wary.

Brent is sold for $86 currently, Heaviest poorest product is $65. Blacklisted Russian Urals crude sold to those without morals for $60
https://oilprice.com/oil-price-charts/#Murban-Crude
Just think the current prices given will not change significantly. Transport should only be a couple of dollars max. However we know other deals have been done.

Top news of the week guys for sure. The two paragraphs that stand out for me are..

Abdullah said Baghdad had been awaiting a response from Ankara to resume the exports, noting that an agreement has now been reached and “there are no more obstacles.”

He also held Baghdad responsible for providing salaries for Kurdistan Region’s civil servants, as the pause in oil exports has hampered Erbil’s ability to do so.

So bit of a case, "send the permissions to send the oil, or send money instead."...

Every stock has a watershed moment, and this deal will move the company to a place we've never been before. Really glad I've taken a decent position. Certainly not a time to sell. Decent temps due which should aid restarts.
So just to quote again, from someone who's clearly in the know.
"There are no more obstacles "...

Thanks Morbox, great reply.

The bed and ISA option is something everyone should do to move the stock into a tax protected wrapper.
Think we should not get carried away as its a standard move that everyone should do.
I'm don't know whether hes bought this stock or its effectively been given to him as a part of a salary reward scheme that most companies operate, when you pay part of it and they give you the rest from company/ shareholders money. Its conditional on a three year hold if I recall for free taxation, and you normally pay one third. This might be the only stock he owns, what normally impresses me is when a company boss purchases a big extra chunk out of his hard earned. Especially when the current price is so low. This has not happened in this case, although would send a message if he did that.