Member Info for dickupham

....what day is it?

.....plse forgive the typos - I should have checked. I'm reasonably literate when I can concentrate............

QC - reference your post of 13.04hrs today. Your best yet and bang on the money. 10/10. The only thing you (perhaps intentionally) have missed out is the largesse (to themselves) they've consistently tried to hide by failing to to include a "directors' remuneration report" in the annual accounts throughout.

I'd have been more active on the posting front myself. Andy Bell sould never have been appointed CFO when he's in his 70s and was financial controller until his elevation to the Board. What could he bring that was new? What the existing board signally failed to do was engage an individual who was/is top of the class in all forms of hedging, instead deciding to stumble ahead on a pre-set "safety first" stragey that led to huge waste.

I'd have posted more frequently in latter times had my health been better - things are challenging at present. "Thank heaven for small mercies" I hear some whisper.

Stay long and strong, although I'm not sure how much of what will eventually happen will be under our control. I'm with Sasa on fair value - the number certainly starts with a 5 and should predoninantly be cash, not paper that could easily lose a good deal of its value on people trying to convert thereto.

GL - I reckon AA would be a lot more interest in 75%+ than a simple majority (50%+) to give him the control he wants

Just my views fwtw. GL

"What is that a Buy or Sell?"..............

.............based on the info available, it looks as if it was a buy order with a limit of 270p that's now been filled. Those with LSE Level 2 (or whatever it's called) mignt be able to throw some more light on the subject?

Had the order been a sell order, seems likely to me we'd have seen the price drifting back, when the reverse has been the case in what has been a thin market of late.

Just guessing. We should have a better indication of fair value in the next couple of months. Hope so anyway - I'm determined to land a few spoils before I'm too decrepit to enjoy them...........the rocket's on ignition. :-)

dyor

...........Anyone have any idea of cash left ?........

£9,431,452.47 as of last Friday at 4.27pm. That's only an estimate though.

Why raise a non-issue, simple simon? Do you seriously think people on here don't know your game?

JOG won't be going to the market for more money any time soon - assuming a farm out is achieved by the end of this year. The terms of the farm out are bound to include a contribution towards back costs, together with a sizeable cash payment to see JOG through until FDP approval at least, at which stage JOG could be put up for sale with certified 2P reserves that will at last put a sensible value on the oil JOG owns and a market cap to match. Alternatively, if it's decided to go all the way, infrastructure funders can be approached to provide the funds JOG needs to pay its share of the infrastructure (a farminee is likely to bear a large part of the spend in return for the % of the action transferred by JOG on signing a FO deal. Repayment of the funds can be made out of the oil landed in the early years of the project - there'll be enough of it to keep eveyone smiling if things go anywhere near plan.

Just a few thoughts on the general subject. Everything critically depends on the directors behaving sensibly, which is never a given. Bigger and better companies than JOG in the past have failed to achive their potential as a result of the actions (or non-actions) of directors who weren't nearly as cleer as they thought they were. I still bear the scars, so I never take anything for granted, however good the future might look.

The way to avoid some of the risks is to get a move on and get an effing deal signed. Everyone's had long enough.

dyor

No, Robsroom - another 10% gets us to 275p.

You have a vivid imagination (as well as a faulty calculator?), which is somewhat unusual in people with the cerebral challenges you must face on a daily basis.

Don't call us...............

Alibro - 250p would look cheap if the price doubled or more. I'm not saying it will, but it's what a lot on here have been waiting for. I had a useful dividend from Serica on Monday, which I used to add a few JOG.

There are no guarantees in this game - I know this from bitter experience.

One day, Rodney.

Any news from the forecourts, Einbert?

GLA

dyor

Sorry - forgot the link:
https://www.investegate.co.uk/serica-energy-plc--sqz-/rns/form-8.3---serica-energy-plc/202207251201386368T/

Food for though - thoughts anyone..............has AA already been talking to the Hardys with a view to acquiring their holding "off book" at a price to be agreed?

Crikey - these are blokes with their noses as deep in the trough as I can ever recall seeing. No wonder they don't want anything to change.

Whilst ACW is to be congratulated for having a relationship with BP that led to Serica being the chosen resipient of BP's effective largesse in all but gifting their BKR interests a few years back, and MF is to be commended for hi skills in merging the two businesses successfully (ie BP's 120 BKR employees with SQZ's existing people, to exceptional financial effect) the process of awarding themselves huge amounts for year upon year after the event, when only relatively modest returns were showing up in the P&L account - partly imv as a result of an inept hedging strategy, is too much to bear.

3 years ago Bell was financial controller (a position he'd held for about 17 years). He's now worth countless millions as a result of his admission to "the special club". Nil cost or deep in the money options, long term incentive plan that pays them dividends on shares yet to be awarded (don't worry - they will be regardless of any conditions said to relate and performance share awards (ditto re dividendspaid). Flegg shyly increased his package to £865k last year (you have to search through the accounts to find detais; none of this "Directors" Remuneration Report nonsense for these characters, which is the norm in most other AIM and other companies. Best to keep things below the radar and hope no-one notices, eh?

Serica's fortunes principally changed not through anything the directors did. Putin invaded Ukraine at around the same time the dimwits in government and countless millions of tree huggers realised every barrel of oil and every therm of gas Britain can produce takes us closer to self-sufficiency in an era when every last boe needed to sustain the economies of countless countries around the world whose annual energy deficits are even bigger than our own.

The worst bit of all (in relation to considering whether SQZ's incredibly greedy - and more than partly deceptive -directors who've been feeding their faces with our money for no reason other than they've been able to) was imv the knee jerk counter offer to buy Kistos as long as it came without Andrew Austin. This behaviour was rash beyond measure because I'm 100% certain they had never once considered such a move until AA's unweklcome intervention. My guess is that SQZ's next planned move was to chuck countless millions of our money down the drain by instigating a share buy back campaign. Nothing could be worse afaic. The premise is that the shares are undervalued. The case will be made that fewer shares in issue will lock in value because they'll trade higher. Trouble is they rarely do. Give me the cash and let me decide what to do with it.

The offer is way too low. To be taken seriously it would have to be all cash afaic. The odds are against a discovery at N Eigg but it isn't taken into account.

I've said enough. No is the answer.

dyor

Greener - I don't know any more than the next bloke but am with you on the sentiments you express in your 10.19hrs post today.

From JOG's perspective, if a deal isn't signed this week we move pretty wuickly into holiday season -- and it's then doubtful anything will be possible to get signed before Sept/Oct at the earliest. That's assuming that what are near perfect conditions still apply a few more months along the line. Also that everything we've been repeatedly told by Benitz for too long now remains true.

The Energy Profits Levy (aka WT) won't be reversed because the money's already been promised to voters. The inability to sensibly manage personal outgoings in the UK is to be lauded. Failure in all its forms is to be commended - let's make a virtue of it. I'm happy enough that it's now taxpayers responsibility to put food on the tables and pay the heating bills of a lot of people who spend their money on things one might question are necessary but are nonetheless regarded as essential by those who waste the money. Sunak's failure to understand the dynamics of the industry he has chosen to damage by making it pay for all this - in individual cases irreparably - is mind-boggling. It's an ill wind, however. I'm looking forward to the extra £700 I'll have in my pocket as a result of Sunak's desperate desire to raise taxes in ways that make him popular with a particular type of voter.

I haven't sold any JOG shares. I just haven't felt inclined to post. I could add a few other things but there's no point.

All the above is imo only. Always dyor.

To save me responding to abuse from the worthies and the clueless, my general response is: "b.ollox" :-)

Au revoir

......."I’d like to see a Director Share Purchase announcement at times like these, heavy share purchases from ACW & MF, show support for their shareholders".............

...........give us a bit of notice before cracking a joke like that in future, flex, would you ..........I nearly choked on my coffee

Notmyjob - you weren't far off the mark in saying Axa halved their holding. From 9.86% down to 5.03%. See RNS 27 May:
https://www.investegate.co.uk/serica-energy-plc--sqz-/rns/tr-1--notification-of-major-holdings/202205271751311519N/

Seems possible Axa picked up some of BP's holding (as notified to the market on 28 April) but that Axa failed to declare it at the time - as it has failed to do at all.
Seems to me there are two possibilities here: (i) someone at Axa has a bad memory or (ii) there's some trickery involved somewhere.
Now which one do I favour...........mmmmmmmm
"My word is my bond" vs money..........
Tricky one that......

Mommur - it's far more likely they're tucked up somewhere with personal financial advisers, plotting the best time to announce the award to themselves of a few hundred thousand "at the money" options for doing such a great deal with BP as recently as 2017. :-)

Not trying to be a killjoy, but it may not be wise to be treating NE as a nailed-on certainty. I can't find much recent data on exploration success in the NS, but the linked article does provide perspective. Can't recall (if I ever knew) why SQZ didn't take the farm out route.
https://www.westwoodenergy.com/news/westwood-insight/north-sea-exploration-performance#:~:text=There%20is%20ongoing%20appetite%20for,of%20exploration%20in%20the%20period.

I don't seem to very popular in viewing the recent (annual ongoing) increase in oil tax of 25% as an unmitigated disaster for the UKCS. A once-off windfall tax would have been bad enough, but what Sunak had just landed on us in a desperate quest for popularity is very likely to be permanent because, by sunset in 2025, he and the Conservatives will be history as a result of what can only be described as the utterly appalling conduct of a whole host of Conservative MPs, their entourage and a large number of (some senior) civil servant based in Downing Street, who were supposed to be setting an example to the rest of the country, not abusing their (largely) overpaid positions of responsibility in ways it is now clear they did..

If anyone is delusional enough to think Keir Stoma (or maybe the 'more electable' Lisa Nandy) is likely to reverse what Sunak has just enacted, they should quickly consult a mental health expert.

SQZ is hit particularly hard by the new tax measures. For instance, how will the money be found to invest in projects that are big enough to avoid this outrageous tax. What impact is it going to have on dividends? There are many other questions that have yet to be answered (although Enquest, Shell and BP have been quick to offer their views - many other sizable oi and gas cos are bound to be reacting in a similar way, they just haven't gone public with their thoughts).

Years of good work by the OGA (now NSTA) has been flushed down the pan in a single move. Trust in the UK Govt within the O&G sector (importantly by a number of powerful overseas-based companies) will have gone for good. And for what? The amount of additional tax raised won't even get close to: (i) the billions in benefits falsely claimed each year by thousands upon thousands of applicants; (ii) the loans made under the so called "bounce back scheme". Need I go on?

Happily for SQZ holders the Company has more than solid fundamentals to support the SP - to an extent at least. Hopefully, when investors have had a chance to consider things properly there will be some kind of recovery - not that markets seem to take that much notice of this.

All imo fwiw - dyor

Ref the so called "sunset clause" the Conservatives will be long gone by then - and deservedly so. If anyone thinks Keir Stoma is likely to end the attack on this industry so vital to this country's prosperity, they're as deluded as Johnson & Sunak.

The message the WT sends out to oil & gas companies around the world about Britain couldn't be clearer: "if you set up in the UKCS, we'll tax you until the pips squeak and we'll use the taxes we collect from you to bribe people to vote for us".

Years of good work by the OGA and certain others undone at a stroke. One of the most damaging political decisions I can recall - right up there with the £6bn pa heist by Gordon on pension savers when he abolished the dividend tax credit (strangely that was never reversed).

Utterly cynical and utterly daft. The sector isn't going to recover from this anytime soon -mark my words. It will become clearer by the day, week and year that the war on carbon energy hasn't ended. It hasn't even begun. I hope for holders' sake here that JOG can sign up with whoever offers the best terms on a farm out. Then at least some worthwhile profit on their investment after years of waiting should be available to take. Sadly I don't share others' (inc PC01's) optimism as to what JOG might become worth in another life as we only have the one we're living in.

Have a good w/e

alsoppc - at last - someone with a bit of sense. No oilco with choices is going to opt to pay tax at 65%

Whether or not people believe a 25% windfall tax - scheduled to be levied annually forever - is a major or minor issue is up to them. A huge spanner has been thrown in the works of any number of UK focused oil and gas cos whose future depends on raising capital, not investing it, mainly because they haven't got any money. A few years back the OGA revised its policy of automatically awarding the best licences to the big players, by awarding them in the first instance to the most enterprising juniors, in the safe knowledge the juniors would have to execute smart farm out deals in the minimum possible time - MER - MAXIMISE ECONOMIC RETURNS - it was the OGA's chosen motto ffs. Work it out.

Who going to want to buy producing fields in the future, when the profits get whacked at a massive 65%? Years, sometimes decades, of work on securing licences, ruling out no-hopers, analysing (at huge cost) those left and in the case of the ones still thought worthwhile after all this risk and cost, then trying to raise the finance to drill exploration wells, only one in twenty of which on average (whatever the stated COS) turn out to contain commercial oil or gas. Then it's on to more fundraising (usually farm out - if not RBL or a mix of both) then it's through FEED, followed by FDP and (eventually and hopefully - ask Trice at HUR what happened to the certain oil in Lancaster or whatever).

And a fair outcome according to our super-rich, power-seeking, principles-free, clueless chancellor - who is unashamedly after Johnson's seat as PM - is (on the profits flowing from the one in twenty commercially justified drills that's cost countless millions - billions even? You can keep 35% and we'll take 65%.

Tinker around with the principles of capitalism at your peril. The North Sea is dying as I write. The reward for enterprise (by oilcos) and saving (investors in oilcos) according to this Government is: 65% for us to give to people who for some inexplicable reason think they should be cushioned from the effects of rising prices by a nanny state.

Liverpool and Manchester are often said to be UK cities in which children are growing up in poverty. There are four Premiership football clubs in the two cities (L'pool, Everton, Man C & Man U). Season tickets (home games only) cost £600-£1000. Each club sells upwards of 25,000 such tickets (prices have been frozen for years) and there's a long waiting list. Thousands of supporters travel to away games. L'pool were allocated 38k recent cup final tickets, which were all immediately snapped up. Cost per ticket? £60-£148. No problem. Wait 'til tomorrow in Paris.

How many of these afficionados are on benefits one wonders. And how many families claim to be living in poverty. The food bank's great - frees up money to spend down the pub. Save something for a rainy day, anyone? Don't be daft, I've spent my vouchers, now I want yours - it's only fair.

Just you wait

Shouldn't we be getting a statement from the "ideas free" fat cats, outlining the effects of the WT on SQZ as they see them - and what actions they propose to take to mitigate these effects.

Or would that be showing too much initiative.

On a separate subject they need to understand that a significant majority of shareholders (as I read things) don't want a share buy back programme initiated. The market just absorbs whatever is enacted and in my experience shareholders gain little or nothing. Directors, however, falsely claim all kinds of achievements (calculations being made from a smaller capital base etc).

It saddens me that I have come to distrust SQZ's directors, whom I held in high regard when I first invested (I'm referring to ACW and Jeffery Harris). I'm not sure what part MF played in negotiating the BKR deals, but when he joined there no doubt he did a fine job integrating the ex BPP team with the much smaller in number SQZ personnel. Then he went on the significantly decrease the cost pb of SQZ's production.

Since those days? Zilch.

Perform or go. Shareholders don't want you to take any more of their money for achieving the square root of FA. Apologies if this woke you up

PC - as I said yesterday: "It's the macro, not micro, picture that's important". You're arguing the micro point in saying you don't think JOG will be affected by this demonstrably unfair tax. With respect, it's impossible to know if JOG will be affected because we don't know the names of the so-called 'counterparties' JOG has been engaged with this past year or more. It's entirely possible one or more of these will walk away (maybe one or more already has) from the farm-out, as a direct result of the imposition of this tax. Back in 2014-16, I lost hundreds of thousands in a junior oilco that couldn't get a farm out when the US vs Saudi spat about market share led to the Saudis (and other OPEC members) turning on the taps to crash oil prices in an attempt to make US fracking uneconomic. Brent Crude fell off a cliff and the industry was crippled. Where was the UK chancellor then, telling UK oilcos: "don't worry - we've been taxing you for donkeys years at 60%+ on your profits, so it's only fair we should give you some of that back, now that times are hard and oilcos all over the place are going bust"? (that's quite funny, even though I say so myself).
All too late the t.wat Osborne woke up and reduced corporation and oil tax to twice what every UK company except (oilcos) pays. But the bird had flown - tax revenues from UK oilcos dried up completely and the drought lasted years.

Happened again in 2019 (Covid and Greta - as nice as each other). Windfall rebates anyone? Nah............

Just as the trees start to blossom (after years of sensitive and well thought-out planning by the OGA) along comes the disgrace Johnson and his equally disgraceful entourage and he and his super rich chancellor decide the voters need to be appeased and what fairer way to do it?

Big oil won't be paying much of the tax - the UKCS isn't of much interest to them anyway. Midcaps and juniors will pay the lion's share. These companies haven't got the funds to invest to avoid being totally crippled - God knows for how long. I'm getting out of the sector as soon as I sensibly can, as Labour will undoubtedly follow the Conservative Socialists.

Reputationally, the UKCS (ie North Sea) has nosedived. Years of good work by the OGA and others undone at a stroke............. and what for? https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-61591517

PC, maybe you'd have slightly different views on the matter if your second largest holding (in my case Serica Energy) had lost more than a third of its value in recent weeks (14% yesterday) as a direct result of the WT. Should I be proud?

How about a windfall tax on the City - aimed at thousands of pension fund managers who get paid millions for failing to match the FTSE because they're so busy trousering fees for lending stocks the beneficial owners don't know are being lent. Check out those SIPPs and see how well they're doing for you..................you'll likely be surprised. Don't know why but something tells me it won't happen...

JODO - everything depends on how strongly you feel about what's happened to a formerly (literally) great country known as Great Britain, nowadays reduced simply to 'Britain', who and what has caused (and is still causing) its rapid decline and why. And the likely effects it will have on one's ability to lead a normal life in relative safety, which includes not being dishonestly parted from one's savings and other hard-won assets.

My gripes are not about selfishness - they're about what's sensible, fair and justifiable and what isn't. What is morally acceptable and what isn't.

We all have our own individual compasses to guide us. I had mine checked recently and it was found by those examining it to be in reasonable working order. If true north on yours is set to Greta Thunberg, then I fear you could be lost for a long time. Hope you eventually find the road leading back to normality, whatever that might be. It definitely isn't what Greta would have you believe.

You describing me as a "right-wing looney ranting at the moon" says a lot more about you than it does about me. Uber socialists who know the square root of jack squat about investing, economics, or anything that requires a shred of intelligence to get one's head around - and understand even less - are ten a penny in the UK today; hence the incredible mess the UK is in. As for "uber-Trumpian rants" you do like the word "uber" don't you, poppet?

Good luck with the gambling. Most people on here prefer investing. There is a difference, although oil & gas is a notoriously difficult sector to make and retain money.

Let's just have a quick recap - you gamble in a few dozen energy shares but you agree with Greta. Tricky one, that.

It's the macro, not micro, picture that's important. Companies (particularly overseas ones) abandoned the North Sea in their droves when it became too expensive and too unpredictable to operate in. In the rare years that profits were actually made, these were then taxed at 60% by the socialist (some would say psychopath) Brown, then 62% under Cameron's lily-livered quasi socialist so-called Conservative Government. Anything that contributed to Cameron's desperation to get and retain the PM's job he and a few of his old Etonian mates had always craved was 'in play'.

Overseas companies were gently starting to show signs of interest in the UKCS after a decade of absence from the area. Getting on for 10 years of sensible stewardship by the OGA (mission: Maximise Economic Returns) looked as if it might soon start to pay dividends. Tax revenues might soon have started to flow back into the Treasury after being absent for so long.

All flushed down the pan at a stroke in an unashamedly politically-driven manoeuvre intended to paint Johnson in a better light in the eyes of the ignorant masses demanding the Government should foot bills that are the personal responsibility of the relevant masses. Divert attention (to the extent possible) away from the disgraceful conduct of highly paid people in the public sector involved in running this Country - God help us all. No wonder we're in such a mess.

This is just a part of the Government's overall debt - add on unfunded (RPI linked) public sector retirement packages, old age pension liabilities and onerous PFI commitments and (depending on the actuarial assumptions adopted) and you get to 8 - £9 tn (yes - trillions). Repeat the saying over and over again and if you're thick enough you might even begin to believe it: "Britain is one of the world's richest countries". Try telling that to someone who's paid taxes all his or her life and has to live in agony for 5 years before s/he gets the hip replacement s/he desperately needs. The money's needed to treat AIDS or perhaps monkey pox. Or maybe to hand over to Rwanda's dictator/Prime Minister (delete where not applicable) at the rate of £1m per economic immigrant waved our way by our old friend Macron.

https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/108530-a-democracy-cannot-exist-as-a-permanent-form-of-government

https://www.nationaldebtclock.co.uk/

Back to JOG - seems entirely possible to me that thanks to Johnson's/Sunak's volte face on oilco taxes, parties previously interested (particularly US ones - if there were any) in a Buchan farm out agreement will now be thinking there are better places to invest in than the UKCS. Not being deliberately negative, just giving my views.

Something will undoubtedly happen some time relatively soon. What it turns out to be is increasingly difficult to determine. Hope it's good for LTHs when/if it does happen.

DYOR