Roundtable Discussion; The Future of Mineral Sands. Watch the video here.
So Cnpc and total have served us noticed to leave the license Tajikistan. Can't believe the board / Pope rejected the offer from Nostrum without at least making sure they had something in place to stump up the $1.7m. The way this company has been run is absolutely atrocious!! We've had about 4 offers on the table at various points that would meant we could maintain our interests for longer and they've still completely ****ed things up! The negligence beyond belief.
Anyone care to guess whats actually happening here! Thought we'd have heard something by now if there was another offer on the table from someone else? Looks like Nostrum are going to get themselves an absolute bargain! Painful.
Ultimately, let's hope they are the ones who end up pig sick because they didn't stump up a $35m equivalent in NOG shares. Can't believe they've taken the risk of missing out on these assets. The Tethys board had already agreed to accept the previous proposal. Ridiculous!
What a bunch of chancers NOG are! That offer is absolutely derisory.
Not sure what the point is for NOG of trying to see if we go into administration. They'd just be fighting it out with everyone else for the assets at bargin basement prices. Doubt that would happen anyway. Not a lack of interest, sinohan, AGR, Nostum, probably others. Only doubt is the value of our own interests when the dust settles.
Presumably tomorrow deadline? Still not good no offer on the table yet though. Tethys received a $5m loan from Nostrum Oil & Gas (NOG) in exchange for a period of exclusivity for NOG to undertake due diligence, to be completed by 24 August. Under the exclusivity agreement, NOG will have two business days to announce an intention to make an offer for Tethys. http://www.edisoninvestmentresearch.com/research/report/tethys-petroleum4
Did they have two days following due diligence to make an offer or was the deadline today?
Half our Kazakstan assets were valued at $75m about 6 months ago. Now it's the whole company for $36m. Even given our weak financial position Nostrum would be absolutely mad not to take Tethys out for that price bearing in mind the assets and partners - especially in Tajikistan. Yet the market doesn't seem too bullish about a deal. Hope I'm not going to be left dazed and confused.
Does anyone know if we are in a position to bring anymore wells on line currently or drill Kyleme? I'd have thought we have sufficient cash to complete the workover of AKK05 and drill Kyleme. Doesn't seem to be much happening at the moment on the operations side and wondering if we're sitting on hands until the AGR money comes in. What's the timeframe for approval?
Pope have a decent stake here so don't think it will go under BUT, I highly doubt any of us will see any benefit once the dust settles. Imagine there will probably be a large equity issue or a debt for equity swap with creditors which means that private investors get absolutely wiped out and they all pick up the pieces. Will probably be another painful lesson for me! The most annoying thing is not being able to learn from it as I still have no idea why the farmout wasn't approved. If the Kazak energy ministry didn't want to approve the farmout they could have taken up the deal themselves but did neither. Regarding what's next - what's the point in another attempted farmout or asset sale, who's to say that would be anymore successful that Sinohan?
So does anyone have any idea why the kazak government have decided not to approve this farmout? Still don't understand - they have put tethys into difficulties, probably destroyed shareholder value and delayed investment in their energy infrastructure but for what end? There is other Chinese investment in the country so really struggling to see what the issue is!!
Week to go - I can't believe this one looks to be going down. I thought the Kazak government can either approve the farm out or take out the deal themselves so can't go too far wrong. NEVER imagined they wouldn't do either!! What's the motivation for not making a decision? Can they just pick up the pieces of Tethys afterwards and run it nationally? Gut wrenching!!
Think it all depends on whether John Byrne can show the debt holders we will be self sufficient soon. I actually don't think we are far off, if the new website we saw a preview of was correct (big if I know) and the Iceland plant is operational then we should nearly be able to cover our basic costs. The future African subsidiary AAP carbon would be profitable based on the new website info. Combined with the German plant due to completion this year which we own 15% equity we may even be making a small profit dare I say it. Would be much easier to attract new investors from that position. However, if John is going to the debt holders promising jam tomorrow as has been the case for a while then it will be tough to get anything that resembles a good deal or maybe even a deal at all. Robster, I don't think it's the technology that is proving the problem, I imagine it's working on plants in UAE, Pakistan, Germany, Iceland, South Africa and China and the company only has around 30 employees and thus probably not many engineers. Maybe that's the managements fault for expanding quickly rather than consolidating. Interested in anyone elses thoughts....
Are you basing that on the fact there have been no more deals? Appreciate they have struggled to build the plants to date, but I very much doubt they have lost interest given how much additional revenue / profit they stand to make from each deal. They are a reasonable size company but not large enough to ignore that kind of opportunity. Made £100m profit last year? Kalina cycle adds $7.9m gross profit per 10MW installed. They claimed to have 20 plants coming - that would be a massive growth opportunity to throw away.
Suppose the only hope that is left to cling onto is that John Byrne didn't take up his rights because an institution is only prepared to take up the rights for a larger proportion of the company. Someone could buy around 40% of the company for $13m? Not a lot of money in today's world and seems like a no brainer despite the slow progress. I do hope Wasabi have spoken to Fl Smidth about taking about the rights given that we are partners in business. They are more likely to appreciate the difficulties faced by the company and we have aligned objectives. Perhaps this is all just wishful thinking at Christmas.
Has anyone had a look at the new website? On the project map it suggests there is an existing plant in South Africa. Can that be anything other than the Arcelor Mittal one? Presume it must be something else because if the 10MW plant is complete that would be massive news.
Ninja, the Husavik plant has not generated any revenue for Wasabi since they acquired it in January 2011. It was not in operation at the time and required refurbishment. Quite frustrating that it seems to be taking so long to repair. Didn't know we had received the revenue for the Khairpur plant, when was that? The shortfall in the last rights issue was taken up by Salida who haven't since sold their full holding, they still own around 3% of the company. Hopefully we should have stakes in 3 build own operate plants from next year with Iceland, Taufkirchen, and the Tulza project in Turkey which should provide reasonable income to reinvest in projects. Don't forget the non core assets and activities of the subsidiaries. Whilst things haven't exactly gone to plan, and we can only speculate about the future, I still have faith in the strategy and will try to take up as much of the rights issue as I can afford.
Wasabi Energy Ltd., a developer of clean-power technology, plans to sell shares in a new unit in Africa as rising demand across the continent lures finance from Asia. “There seems to be a lot of funding that is wanting to go towards Africa,” Diane Bettess, chief operating officer of the Melbourne-based company, said by telephone. “Chinese companies have built themselves up and got massive penetration in China and now they’re looking for growth so they’re looking outside.” Wasabi, whose technology captures waste heat to produce electricity, has already proposed to fund its Asian division in a similar way — planning an initial public offering for the unit later this year. Now it’s turning to Africa as nations struggle to meet power demand amid burgeoning population growth. Wasabi expects to establish the new unit and start the fundraising once it has projects in Africa to serve as a “spring board,” Bettess said. The process will be under way within the next year, she said, without providing details of how much it intends to raise. The company is already present in Africa through its 62.5 percent holding in clean-energy developer AAP Carbon Holdings Ltd. Wasabi intends to license its technology to AAP, which plans power stations in Africa’s industrial and renewable-heat industry. The Australian company also has already worked with Chinese partners, agreeing in January to install equipment for a unit of China Petroleum & Chemical Corp. in a $10 million deal. Geothermal potential Wasabi’s Kalina Cycle technology generates electricity from low-heat sources and can be used in geothermal plants, metalworks and oil refineries. In Africa, Kenya already has a geothermal industry, while the South African market is “very strong,” Bettess said. South Africa is seeking to add 3,725 megawatts in renewable-energy capacity by the end of 2016 through a 100 billion-rand ($9.8 billion) program to help reduce its dependence on coal-fired power. Wasabi said in May that it planned to fund its Asian unit through an IPO toward year-end. The shares will probably be sold on the Singapore stock exchange, Bettess said this week.
http://www.proactiveinvestors.co.uk/companies/news/63639/wasabi-energy-chairman-rights-issue-required-to-realise-potential-63639.html The market’s known we’ve been unfunded for a while and we wanted to put an end to it,” chairman Byrne told Proactive Investors. “So rather than do a little one, we’ve said we’re going forward full-on, one-for-one, all shareholders.” As a major shareholder – he owns 11.1% of the company’s issued share capital – Byrne says he understands the pain felt by shareholders on the receiving end of the discount. “I’m up there, I’ve bought more than anybody. I’ll be taking up my entitlement and I think some of our biggest shareholders will as well.” Byrne reckons it will be the last time it comes to the market for funding. Once the company becomes cash generative as its power plants come online , it will fund itself.
Think the company has enough to contend with at the moment. Can't you just read the investor presentation on the website or the RNS statements. Pakistan (8.6MW) and UAE (4.5MW) are both being built by Fl Smidth under license and are not build own operate. They will command a one off payment to Wasabi of roughly $1m and $500,000 respectively. Sinopec in China is also a EPC contract so presume that will also be a one off fee. Tulza in Turkey, Arcelor Mittal, Iceland and Taufkirchen in Germany are build own operate. Think Wasabi only has 15% equity in the German project. The Iceland plant is the one that really bothers me as that has been in refurbishment for 2 years and would provide some basic income. AAP carbon is also working on numerous projects but details on what is happening there have been very light. I have recently topped up at these prices. There is no middle gorund with this now, it's possibly the best investment you'll ever make or you're losing it all. Either way I think we'll know a lot more at the end of the month. Good luck all.