Member Info for Flavius

The descending trendline is followed so strictly and "geometrically" that only algo-trading explains what is happening: small short positions are opened continuously in order to bleed this share by "one million cuts" as I've been repeating in the last few months. Short interest trackers do not actually help as they show only positions above 0.5%, which is clearly not much relevant considering the ridiculous trading volumes that underpin the current relentless descending trend.

Personally I suspect that there is a plot behind this. Look at WG: potential bidders come out, then they refuse to proceed with the bid, accordingly the SP collapse and then... they come back again for "rescue". Possibly for 1/10 of the value of the previous offer.

Unsurprisingly this is what happened with TLW as well: a proposal for takeover, and then SP collapse after failing to make an offer. Then, in spite of positive news like the fiscal dispute resolution, the SP continues to go down relentlessly. This definitely bears the fingerprints of SP manipulation. Wait a little bit more, and another "white knight" will pop-up "saving" this company offering a bunch of peanuts to desperate shareholders.

Unless something major happens in the next few weeks, I will be increasingly convinced that institutional holders are playing a role in this game. Their silence, their lack of action and interest in sustaining the SP is at least suspicious.

Anybody knows how power is generated for water injection purposes on Jubilee? Gas generators on the FPSO? I honestly wonder what is this "major issue" with power gen affecting the WI rates?

It reads:

"Charlie Sharp’s rating is based on a detailed analysis of Tullow Oil’s potential for growth. Despite the decision to lower the target price from 35p to 25p, the stock is still considered attractive due to its underlying value and strategic positioning. The buy rating reflects confidence in the company’s ability to navigate market conditions and capitalize on upcoming opportunities.

Sharp appreciates Tullow Oil’s efforts to manage operational efficiencies and cost structures, which are vital for its financial health. The assessment suggests that, with the right execution of its plans, Tullow Oil could see significant upside potential, making it a favorable investment choice for those looking at long-term gains"

Today's drop was due to the latest rating update by Canaccord Genuity which is actually a "strong buy" on the expectation of "long term growth potential" but at the same time they cut the TP by a further 30% from 35 to 25p just...4 weeks after the previous update.

One really wonders what has happened in the last 4 weeks to justify such a downgrade. Someone (many ones) are willing to buy extra-cheap. As we all know.

Price chart is following a descending trendline started in the 3Q of 2024 (ahead of the triple top at 40p). No static support was able to stop this movement which clearly bears the fingertips of algo trading.

Bad news is there's just two support levels left: area 14-15 (we are nearly there) which acted as a support in October 2020. And area 10 with the (in)famous bottom of 8p that we all know very well.

Good news is the "algo-trendline" cannot be maintained for much longer as with this trend in one year's time the SP would be zero. The only issue here is whether it will just re-test the 14p-15p support, or rather the 8-10p. I was criticised a few weeks ago when I made the point that I would keep a "reserve" to buy some more shares if this tests the 8-10p area, but the real point here is that this share is manipulated as a penny stock with the support of algos: no one is interested in its value, nor in the value of its asset. It's just a manipulation game and as such, we need to be ready for all the scenarios, even the most incredible ones.

Sooner or later this will have to reverse the descending trend. Even in the absence of news if OP is maintained at current levels. I will not give up now, after holding for so long and in such a loss. They won't have me (not for such a low price, at least).

GILT rates are exploding higher also today. Accordingly, algos are selling TLW also today. Considering the lack of interest in the share, algos are probably the only movers of the SP. We need lower interest rates in the UK but this is increasingly difficult as inflation keeps growing (great job Starmer, congratulations).

All highly-indebted companies are being sold today, and not only in the O&G sector as even at the BCE they're talking about interrupting the rate cuts (great idea for an economy in shambles). There's not an easy way out, here. The share is clearly undervalued, but the bloodbath is relentless as algos rule.

This is today's news: "Borrowing costs hit the highest level for more than a quarter of a century yesterday – meaning Rachel Reeves is on the brink of breaking her fiscal rules. In yet another setback for the Chancellor in the wake of the Budget, the yield on 30-year gilts topped 5.25 per cent for the first time since 1998"

Not by chance, LSE was the worst performer in Europe (it's happening rather often lately). The real issue here is "what TF is happening to UK economy? What are the geniuses running the Country doing?"

One looks at Petrofac, then at Wood Group, it's a slaughter of UK industrial players. Luckily TLW has valuable (and tangible) assets which definitely rule out a Wood-style collapse. But the point here is another: there's a government in the UK which acts as an enemy to industry, growth, development, and prosperity of its fellow citizens accordingly. Issuing trillions of long term debt with developing-country interest rates is putting a noose around the neck of many generations of British citizens to come.

Totally dumb green-climate-crisis narrative is funneling trillions of GBP into ridiculous initiatives like carbon capturing which create zero benefits to the people and in the meantime "conventional" profitable business like Oil and Gas is left agonizing. In order to support such dumb "green" economy, piles of debt are being issued, and inflation is generated accordingly. This is totally crazy. And let me say, as an Italian guy, you are running down the same path that destroyed Italian economy for decades.

In a market with ridiculous volumes, algos count. A lot. Algos sell debt-burdened stocks on the LSE when GILTS go up: they are simple-minded, they just do what they have been asked to do. This explains the apparently senseless price action for TLW. Leaving the LSE would be a good start. Of course much more is needed, and expected from the new CEO. Keep living in hope. Hard times.

The problem of course is not in the interest rate of the already-issued bonds, but in the cost of refinancing that debt at expiry. A 10% IR on a 1b debt is equivalent to about 100 million GBP additional cost every here. Not peanuts.

GILTS are not helping. At all. UK has by far the highest interest rates among "most developed economies". 150pts more than Greece itself. One wonders if the UK really deserves to be considered a developed economy nowadays... However, high interest rates are a big issue for debt-burdened companies like TLW. Algos sell debt-burdened stocks in a high interest rate scenario. Trading on the LSE just make things worse.

This is not the work of shorts, rather opportunistic buyers looking for a potential bottom and then selling as SP continues to drop like a stone. All in all it is simply impossible to price this share for the simple reason that the 6.2 b contracts rather than an asset could very well be a liability. How many greenish projects potentially losing more money are inside that 6.2 b portfolio? How risky are those investments? How difficult will it be to get access to credit to get those projects done? Nobody knows, and what is more, nobody can trust this BoD.

Accordingly the market is pricing the worst case scenario: a debt burdened company with a potentially toxic portfolio. It's the CEO responsibility to demonstrate that this is not the case and the SP will skyrocket accordingly. Otherwise the SP will keep falling, with zero as a TP.

How desperate must a shareholder be, to believe in a promise of FCF in 2026 when the same CEO made the same promise about 2025 and scr***d it completely after a few weeks? The real issue here is credibility, which is an invaluable asset in itself.

Without a new CEO any discussion about the future is just futile.

I bought some 10,000 shares as an opportunistic buy after the previous fall to 50p level hoping in a quick recovery of the SP. Blame myself for not selling before yesterday, just my fault. But the overall scenario is honestly terrible.

I've already seen this movie in the past as I participated in the recapitalization of Saipem, a very painful and dilutive move which was necessary after burning billions equivalent of cash flow in ridiculous green projects. Saipem came out of the ditch but the SP was smashed to smithereens, big banks stepped in, and Eni supported the recapitalization as major shareholder.

The situation here is much worse: the BoD is totally disqualified, the business is actually not profitable, at least so far. And for the future? How many bull**** green project are still in that 6b portfolio? How profitable are they? Maybe Sidara knows better?

And then the biggest issue: after the total loss of credibility of current management and the current precarious financial position, how can this company bid for billion-worth EPC projects? Any basic due-diligence would scrap it from the bidders' list at the earliest stage of a tender process.

Unless a major, hyper-dilutive recapitalization is undertaken at the expense of the shareholders. this company is a dead duck. I can just wish the best of luck to all the shareholders who bet on this cause: it's a desperate bet but I wish you success and better times than this.

PS: I'm also a Tullow shareholder and cursing myself every day for that. I just wonder why my "British shares" have been the worst-performers in my portfolio in the last years. Maybe not a coincidence.

There's an easy explanation for this nightmarish update: it is consequential to the ongoing review.

Due to the ongoing review they couldn't hide the issues, embellish the situation and announce future earnings just by kicking the can to the following quarter. Maybe for the first time in a few quarters they were forced to tell the truth. Now we know why the previous takeover attempts failed miserably.

They keep talking about "lump sum projects" omitting though that the disruption came from "green" lump sum projects.

Cost increase in the oil and gas business has never been such a big problem as O&G companies typically have very deep pockets and work on such big margins that an agreement is easily found between the EPC Contractor and the Client.

Green projects are another story: they are delivered on extremely narrow margins and clients (read utility companies) are typically very reluctant to absorb part of the extra-costs. Accordingly such extra-costs are left with the Contractor and become liabilities.

The idiotic top management still at the helm of this unfortunate company is still in denial mode. They need to be all kicked out, the sooner the better.

As all the other competitors in the industry left the green ship sinking and swiftly turned to highly profitable offshore conventional "dirty" oil and gas business, at WG the smart guys in the room kept pushing the narrative of marvelous and planet-saving decarbonization projects: windmills and ridiculous CO2 injection projects bringing negative profits and burning cash like hell: they played it political, and they **** it all.

Running a company is not like ruling a country: you may very well have a clownish incapable government in the UK (as it actually is), but in the hand it will put the hands in the pockets of their citizens and keep afloat. WG has no place to go, unless it kicks out the CEO and restarts from the scratch, with the oil and gas business that made the fortune of this company.

But it's probably late to turn the ship around and the last hope here is a takeover by one of those very companies which made rich profits in the last years by just doing dirty oil and gas.

Unfortunately Wall Street is relentless in their shorting the OP for political reasons, and this definitely won't help. The last "justification" is just hilarious as the narrative is that in case of peace in Ukraine prices will fall as there will be more oil supply. This is just idiotic as Russia selling oil at big discount for sanction evading purposes is just one of the main reasons for the low price environment we're currently in. In the long term OP will need to go up for fundamentals reasons read lack of supply (US production in spite of the narrative hasn't increased in the last one year). But in the short term it's hard, we definitely need a new CEO upsetting the applecart, in a way or in another.

I wouldn't rule out an equity recapitalization as part of an overall plan to reduce the debt. It would be very dilutive on the SP, but this would not be a big issue for the institutional owners if they commit to buy the unsold shares, accordingly further increasing their control and approaching a full "take-over" scenario. This would on the one hand help decreasing the debt by a few hundreds million GBP while providing fresh capital for drilling/exploration activities. As an alternative, such fresh capital would make the company more attractive to potential bidders.

Selling Gabon would be terrible from a business perspective as there's already too much concentration of activities (and risks accordingly) in Ghana. Selling a stake of Ghana would be more sensible, provided something is interested to step-in.

On thing is clear: debt needs to be reduced, and current production (and OP) perspectives will hardly allow to reduce it as quickly as it was in RD' plans. Hence, either you sell assets, or you strengthen capital structure. It would be very painful for current shareholders, but it is probably the only way to come out of the ditch and rebuild this company on more solid foundations.

Anton while you have definitely a point about shorters closing, bumps up and usual drop thereafter, I don't agree on ruling out that shorters could be acting on behalf of parties interested in a takeover.

In my opinion though the most likely scenario is a delisting. Because it would not be such a terrible effort for institutional parties (already owning 60% of the shares) to purchase the floating 40% for just 250mm GBP or even less. It actually makes sense from many standpoints: there is definitely value in this company, there's some interesting assets to explore, there's quite a lot of oil to be extracted, there's some P3 reserves waiting to be promoted to P2 after ILX campaigns. On the other hand, retail ownership at these SP levels is just... useless: as the SP is too low for such retail ownership to provide significant benefit to the company: a significant recapitalization would be too dilutive for the shareholders (e.g. 1 billion would be equivalent to issuance of 4x shares) and accordingly doomed to failure. Purchasing the floating shares and de-listing would just empower current institutional investors to fully enjoy future profits once the debt issue is sorted.

Conspiracy theory? Maybe. But in light of the above it would definitely be in the institutional ownership's interest to depress the SP in order to buy extra-cheap and rake in huge profits when the SP is destroyed. How to do that? Ridiculous communications management, holding a discredited CEO for too long at the helm, zero support to the SP via buybacks or-the-like. And then the complacent assistance from some "rating agencies" lowering the SP every now and again to spread panic among the retail cattle.

Whoever lives will see, and I'll be one of them as I'm not willing to leave the ship. Not at this SP level.

Don't know. But I know for sure that Stifel is helping the cause (today they just slashed the TP down to 18). Next Stifel update will probably have zero as TP. Then somebody will be able to make an offer for 0.01 GBP. Laugh not to cry.

There is virtually no support below 18, down to 7pc. Current capitalization is so low that a take-over or a de-listing is definitely in the cards: this company can be taken over literally for free with the only issue of refinancing the debt. For sure several interested parties are acting behind the scenes manipulating the price to the low, relentlessly, to depress the SP and increase the profitability of the takeover.

There's a key aspect here that apparently very few of us are considering: something like 60% of the ownership of TLW is institutional. 9 investors hold 51% of the shares. Accordingly floating shares are very few and likewise very few are the decision makers and the price movers.

There's something really fishy here: the relentless downward pressure over the SP, the CEO leaving but... staying, the grotesque takeover attempt by Kosmos, the incredibly poor communication overall. IMHO we cannot rule out that the property (that 60% institutional ownership) has been cooking something for a very long time, to the expense of desperate retail shareholders. We will probably know soon.