Member Info for BladeOIM

Brian Mitchener was sat at his desk gazing aimlessly out of the window one morning.
Parson says "Brian, stop doing that"
A fed up Mitchener replies "why boss"
Parsons says "because you'll leave yourself with nothing to do this afternoon"...

MTSparky and Mytton.
I'm not suggesting that Denziiil has said anything untrue.
But there's liabilities here that aren't obvious by the figures quoted by Denziil, thats all.

Look,
if you don't want to be fully informed and only want to hear positives, fair enough.
Rockrose got the deal of a lifetime under the conditions in which they bought (or were basically paid to buy) the Marathon assets. But investors should be aware of the full story.

They wanted to become an "Operator" and this looks to be very short lived.
They still have liabilities on a pension scheme that they own 40% of, that has a fund requirement of over £500mm and whilst it's performing OK, it is not fully funded at this time. They'll likely sell this to an insurance company but that comes at a premium. In other words and as an example, an insurance company will only take on a £500mm pension fund if paid £600mm to do it.

I won't write on here again.
You crack on and invest unwittingly without fully understanding the risk potential. Trying to add facts and get shot down because it isn't all rosy rosy rosy stories.

Good luck. I'm sure you'll do well.

Denziiil, I'm not so sure.

Marathon Oil were established and competent operators of the Brae assets.
Rockrose bought out Marathon's share, assuming that they'd become operators.
But Marathon only owned 40% of the Brae assets.
Other partners including Taqa (who incidentally own more than 40%) DO NOT want Rockrose as operators and have voted to remove them from the operator position, leaving Taqa to operate the assets. All the partners want this. A unanimous decision.

So what does this mean.
Well, Rockrose still have to fund 40% of operating costs whilst yes, they still take 40% of the profit stream.
But they don't "grow" as a company because they're still not "operators".
They function and provide funds as Taqa and the other partners request.

Whilst in all likelihood, the Taqa operator-ship exchange will go through and the current Rockrose (ex Marathon) employee's will transfer to Taqa - as part of the deal with Marathon, Rockrose took on the old final salary pension scheme and will retain this responsibility as Taqa will refuse to take over responsibility for this £500mm+ scheme.

A few years ago, Marathon took Taqa to the high court because of Taqa's refusal to pay their allocated share of the pension liabilities. There is absolutely no way that Taqa have to or will want to take on the pension fund that Rockrose now sponsor - just because Taqa want to become current day operators. The pension scheme is a liability that Rockrose took over from Marathon.

All a bit of a mess and will be resolved eventually.

No doubt about it - for the amount that Rockrose paid for the Brae assets, they've worked a great deal.
But it's turning into less than they thought it was going to be.

Google and read for yourself. Taqa versus Rockrose

https://www.energyvoice.com/oilandgas/north-sea/204198/taqa-moves-to-oust-rockrose-energy-as-operator-of-north-sea-hub/

On May 22nd, part of the RNS said "The Board believes it is now the right time to explore the monetisation options available to the Company in respect of its Eastern Moroccan portfolio and has decided, with support from Rothschild & Co, to market its Eastern Moroccan portfolio with a view to assessing a sale, prior to FID".

My interpretation of this may be wrong but I can see Sound continuing on a smaller scale in Western Morocco if the Eastern Morocco assets are indeed sold in the next few months.

But the "lesser sized" Sound Energy would still need funds in order to continue.
After all, there's significant salaries to be paid.

So in the event of a buyer coming along with a reasonable bid for Tendrara, would the money be fairly be distributed to shareholders or would a portion be held back ?

A valid question as I think our understanding of the "LE" may be different to what JP and co are envisaging...

In late May when Sound announced the marketing of the "Eastern" Morocco asset and paused the drilling on Te11, I had a view that there were probably buyers wanting to take on the challenge.
I thought it was just a case of working out the sale price and WHEN.

Back in the heady days of Te6 and 7, I thought we'd eventually be fighting off would be suitors and this board regularly talked about the Russians, the Chinese, the Moroccan government, the Spanish, Shell - all being ready and waiting to make their move once the basin was proven over a wider area.

As we enter the third month since the marketing effort was announced and the SP floundering between 7p and 9p, I do wonder IF this will come to an end rather than WHEN.

If not, the only option I see is further dilution and more drilling.
If that occurs, a drill bit won't hit the ground this year and this could go on for many years to come given that drilling Te8, 9 and 10 took well over two years.

So given the choice of a personal big loss at a LE of 35p or more years of this, I'd take 35p all day long.

But if I was on James Parsons renumeration package, the choice of dismissing low ball offers and pressing on for a few more years would appeal.

After stating in February 2017 that a LE would occur after eighteen months, followed by three non commercial drills, he probably had no choice than to go for a monetisation attempt.
If nothing else, this resets the "eighteen months" clock for Parsons.

When or if that does not come to fruition, we're here for the longest haul ever. Simply cannot sell at a SP of 9p.

Good posts Table..
Makes you wonder what changed, when and why.
More intriguing is what the change in direction and strategy means to JP and his pals.

The CEO that sold shares when imploring PI's to buy or hold.

I recall PNE saying that he held 670,000 shares.
Whilst he may have bought a portion of these AFTER the SP hit £1.02, to be sat here now at 8p and losing around £600k on paper must be as painful as losing £70k of investment hard cash.

In other words, it's not just those who bought in at the 80's and 90's who feel anguish at this.

But well done Crudehope for buying low, selling high and paying their mortgage off - then telling others to take a look in the mirror.

There's only one that should be looking in the mirror and he's called James Parsons.

Used to value his posts.
Common sense and direct.
Where are you PNE - presumably just fed up with this share like the majority of us....

Gaspunter.
Read my post again.

Add up the SP values of Sound, Echo and Coro and it comes to 12 pence.

What's difficult to understand ?

is the collective value of Sound, Echo and Coro shares. The Parsons empire.
Who'd have predicted this.

As an eternal optimist I hope that this eventually comes good BUT, I have my doubts that Parsons will find a buyer and wonder what happens when this for sale period extends into 2020.

And people said Bitcoin was a gamble....

GL all. We need it.

Joe,
The problem that i have with continuing this Morocco project is simply down to too many missed timelines and false promises. No faith in the BOD now.
12 to 18 months was first quoted around three years ago.
We suffered the agonising wait of doing nothing whilst the seismic was completed over about a year but were all convinced this would unlock the basin and we'd be successful thereafter.
The Gherkin - Many many multiples (when the share sat at 82p)
A financial legacy for ourselves and our families.
Then the seven months of delays with Te10.

I've had enough now but can't sell at 10p.
I just want a sale and this investment to come to a complete END.

That made me laugh out loud Ducati2.

It's all you can do at this time.

The Dandy Highwayman.
How apt.

Rocket,
I've added at various times and now have around £70k invested.
So to walk away with £20k now is about as good as I'm expecting.

Funnily enough, I also have around £10k in Echo and that's also about 60% down.

Not life changing losses for me but also not something that I expected.

I completely understand and concur with your anger and frustration.

When a CEO talks up a share in the manner that JP did at the Gherkin, how are we supposed to know that AIM listed company CEO's are not like the CEO's of Major companies.
We know now but it's too late.
Sound were the first AIM company that I've put money into.

Crude,
Perhaps you could have a little more empathy for those that are well underwater here.
We're not bad people. Just had bad judgement and disappointingly, you've been a major part of the diatribe that led people to believe in the OVER hype.

If I can walk away from this with only a £50k loss, I'll be happy and never look back.

24%

I don't know what was expected but...

how would the SP react if the flow was around 15k bbls/day through a 25% choke ?

MrToad
Thank you.

I know and accept that this is lazy and I really should filter through the RNS feeds.
But...
I've just invested in the share based on news on one of the wells.
However, I don't know how many wells there will be and over what sort of time frame.
Can anyone enlighten me with a basic summary of the plan ?

A hopeful RNS and we rise by less than a penny.

Yet a negative RNS would have slaughtered us.

I can't work out this AIM game.

I suspect even JP and his BOD must be getting to the point where they too want an end to the saga.

Best post of the day came from PNE at 1920.
"Todays announcement was positive and another step in the right direction but not definitive.
I believe not much will move this share until we have concrete, unequivocal results which are only a month or so away."

Roll on June.

After half an hour driving one of those, you'd look like Wurzel, Crude.

That said, if Sound doesn't come in, I'll be dressed like Wurzel in retirement :)