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So... BV writes "Oktane, it was far from a "simple sidetrack" with the Geology, "... and he is of course absolutely correct to state this.

It's a shame therefore that Lucan spent considerable time and effort repeatedly assuring everyone stupid enough to listen that the sidetrack would take an absolute max of seven weeks to complete and come on stream, start to finish.

It's more of a shame that Lucan then went incandescent with rage and denial when it was pointed out that, in direct contradiction to what he was assuring, the company's own submitted planning permission into LIncs CC for drilling the sidetrack estimated a timescale of sixteen weeks.

The biggest shame is that it in fact took from Oct 28th last year to May 2nd this year to get the sidetrack completed (not counting flow clean-up). That's twenty six weeks...

However, we are where we are, with the sidetrack now flowing. However, none of the more rabid cheerleaders have ever advanced an explanation as to why the ANGS SP Is as low as it is, which speaks volumes. As for me, like a fair few others here, I simply don't trust this share.

As noted earlier, from the comment that Ocelot quoted, the ANGS board doesn't seem to believe that Saltfleetby as it is now merits a share price of 3p.

And no, BV, I am not OofyProsser or any other ID. Hard though it seems for you to get your head around, there are other possible reasons why more than one person might decide that being wary on ANGS is a rational position to take...

BeachHut, there's nothing wrong with healthy cynicism when it comes to both AIM stocks and the bulletin boards discussing those.

I am sure that those you suspect of existing do exist. I am even more sure that their antimatter counterparts exist as well, i.e. people who have bought in and who profess wildly optimistic opinions that they don't believe at all, in an effort to drive the price higher so that they can sell out with more of a profit/less of a loss. In fact I'd bet that there are many more of the latter type.

Anyhow as ever, a generic large pinch of salt is very much order of the day.

Ab76, re your last paragraph.

Another of the several things I found significantly surprising in the latest set of answers to investor questions was the following:-

"With production up at Saltfleetby, the Board’s priority now is to identify inorganic opportunities for growth which would provide the route to a £100m valuation. The Board is also evaluating the potential value in the longer-term of a gas storage solution at Saltfleetby."

Taking that at face value, the board seems to be overtly stating that in its opinion Saltfleetby by and of itself, in its own right and as it exists now does not justify an ANGS MCap of £100 million (or an SP of 3p, to put it another way).

Apparently new "inorganic" opportunities are needed for "growth which would provide the route to a £100m valuation".

Given the prospective future SP predictions advanced by more than a few here (including Singhie's endlessly reworked future share price predictor), I found that particular comment noteworthy. It certainly seems to shed some light on what value the ANGS board puts on Saltfleetby in its current form - and it seems to be considerably less than the cheerleaders have been baying about.

For those with longer memories here, joining the EEC (the European Economic Community, a free trade market) in the mid 70s was a no-brainer and an obviously great idea - and in fact the electorate voted in favour of doing so.

Signing up to the EU (the European Union, which is what the EEC transmogrified into) in the early 90s was definitely not such an obviously great idea, especially since the electorate was not given any vote on doing so at the time.

No matter one's opinions on Brexit, the one thing I am personally sure of is that centralisation always ends up being taken too far, with any initial benefits being soon outweighed by ever-growing downsides. Lack of accountability, lack of adaptability, ever more costly layers of bureaucracy, to name just three...

Oofy, as with almost all things ANGS, the wording is ambiguous.

To me it reads that ANGS has the option of settling the bridging facilities in shares at a minimum price of 0.75p (that being 25% lower than the minimum allowed 30 day VWAP). If the 30 day VWAP is below the stated minimum 1p level, then this "repayment in shares in lieu of cash" option is no longer available to ANGS.

It does indeed. Does that then mean that Aleph does not understand the value?

A_D,

1. The whole issue of cashflow is murky. The whole reason for the recent two swathes of £9m total borrowing is entirely unclear.

2. Agreed.

3. Sure, the debt may be able to be rolled forward (after all, ANGS did just that with the initial £3m and cost themselves 3% in doing so, as per the terms of the borrowing). It may also be able to be refinanced.

4. Granted, nobody knows.

5. Agreed, though I don't think it's PF who's helping find funding. That's all Mercuria, Aleph and Kemexon.

6. That is a very good question that many have been asking. ANGS itself has now finally admitted it is facing a short-term cashflow issue (which several here have been forecasting for a while). I also don't believe for one second that much (if any) of this recently sought £9 million is pencilled in for new ventures - because as you rightly point out, it'd make no sense to borrow money at those eye-watering rates to invest in new opportunities. Instead, I am sure these funds are urgently required to meet already incurred liabilities (the missed hedges that George assured had already been covered by the Xmas £7 million megaplacing last year) and also to provide ANGS enough working capital to run SFBY.

Another purely factual point worth being aware of...

If the SP stays below the 1p level for the next few months, then ANGS no longer has the option of repaying the recently borrowed £3 million and the even more recently borrowed £6 million in shares. Instead it'll have to find the cash (plus c. 20% interest) to pay these back... £3+ million by end Sep and £6+ million by end Dec.

From the March 28th RNS detailing the terms under which both bridging facilities (aka the "junior loan") were taken:

"The Company has the option to repay the junior loan in shares at a 25% discount to the 30 day VWAP, subject to a floor at 1p and this same option is also available to the lender but only in the event of default."

Mind you, if ANGS can lay its hands on that sort of cash within those timeframes, it might be better than further dilution?

BV says:

"PMSL, I wonder if the trolls get a bonus to get the SP lower"

Not that I can ever take seriously anyone seriously who litters their fact- and intellect-free posts with teen internet acronymns (like PMSL, LMAO, ROFL and LOL)...

...but with his claimed average now being neared, I imagine it would have been more truthful for BV to just post "PMS" and leave off the last "L".

Either that, or he's set to be the last man standing when it comes to not spotting that the emperor is in fact not wearing any clothes. Truly tragicomic, but hey, it takes all sorts.

Two things.

First, I'm not advising anyone to do anything. Second, my lengthy post below solely highlights what ANGS itself has directly said at various times over the last six months, either via RNS or via answers to IQs.

The fact that there are very clear and glaring discrepancies between ANGS's various statements is nothing to do with me. Sure, as you put it, "crap" may have been spouted... but if so, it's been spouted by the company.

The latest set of answers to investors' questions actually raise more questions than they give answers.

Firstly, ANGS has now raised three separate swathes of cash i the last six months.

On the 18th Dec, the £7m Xmas megaplacing was allegedly conducted for the following reasons:-

"The net proceeds of the Fundraising will be utilised by the Company to accelerate the drilling programme to expand production, the evaluation of acquisition opportunities, fund operational activities, settle a liability that has recently arisen under the Company's hedging arrangements and for the Group's general working capital purposes."

Note the "...settle a liability that has recently arisen under the Company's hedging arrangements" phrase.

Then on 28th Mar, we got unexpected news of the £3m bridging facility at eye-watering c. 20% interest rates which was allegedly:-

"...to manage costs arising from the extended drilling operations as well as initial studies around the development of natural gas and hydrogen storage at Saltfleetby."

The same 28th Mar RNS also stated that "Company has drawn down GBP 3m of debt and currently has no further cash requirements for Saltfleetby operations"

GL also said at the same time that "As such these funds are expected to satisfy the majority (if not all) of the earlier closed hedges.“

And yet the just released answer to the IQ regarding the latest news of an extra £6 million of borrowings again at c. 20% states:-

"...this final rolled hedge payment (arising from late production in 2022), when netted with other rolled hedges, turned out to be larger than expected. Angus is taking on additional short-term debt to manage the settlement of that hedge as well as to provide working capital for Saltfleetby and evaluation of acquisition opportunities."

Hang on a second...

ANGS already stated it didn't need any extra funding for Saltfleetby operations, as per above?

ANGS already stated that the vast majority (if not all) of its missed hedge liabilities had already been covered, as per above?

How on earth can any missed hedge payment "turn out to be larger than expected"??? The terms of all hedges have been known for ages and as the cheerleaders keep trying to assure everyone, GL is apparently a finance expert... so what could possibly be "unexpected"?

And for that matter, what are the "other rolled hedges" that this "unexpected" hedge liability has been netted with?

Sadly, it seems to be the usual deliberate opacity from ANGS, with nothing making any sense as usual and thus causing a marked lack of trust from the market. As a result, I cannot see the SP recovering any time soon.

Why wouldn't I point it out, BV? Unlike you, I am a believer in verifiable facts, rather than wild supposition.

As Gallder's latest set of daily figures show, that oddly charitable secondary hedge has now ended, so ANGS's daily revenues are reduced to "unassisted" levels, with only the original hedge arrangements now applying.

CF Gallder's correctly stated daily revenue estimates of c. £51k for June 30th, but now c. £32k for July 1st, based on broadly similar reported production volumes.

Oofy, my understanding of derivative hedge contracts matches yours to a t. Having said that...

What has always been a complete mystery is why on earth Mercuria (who did indeed have ANGS face down and bare buttocked over a barrel) agreed to the secondary set of hedge contracts at such inordinately high prices? If this 2nd set was a standard hedge as both you and I understand them, then it seems to all intents and purposes to be a pure act of charity, in that the 2nd set effectively xeems to "give" ANGS almost £4 million of extra gain between Jan and Jun for doing nothing.

This has always seemed decidedly weird, because Mercuria are very definitely not a charity. But nobody's yet come up with an alternative scenario that makes more sense.

Average_Dave, good post, except I think you're overestimating the monthly revenues somewhat.

VERY roughly speaking, of its 3 million therms a month, ANGS will effectively sell half of those at say 40p a therm, courtesy of the ongoing hedge arrangements. So that's £600k of revenue, plus whatever it sells the remaining 1.5 million therms for... shall we be bullish and say 100p per therm?

Total monthly revenue therefore would equal £2.1 million.

It's really not that good an RNS, with (as the more rational here have pointed out) the elephant in the room being the surprising announcement that the ANGS board needs to treble short-term and very costly borrowing up to £9 million, with the extra £6 million being at the same eye-watering c. 20% interest rates.

That short-term cash flow issue I've been highlighting more than once is clearly more drastic than ANGS has let on... and hence the market is currently voting with its feet. Perhaps no surprise against a backdrop from the cheerleaders trying to assure one and all that ANGS is now awash with cash... which it very obviously can't be.

The other key point from the HY report is that ANGS seems to have managed to pay off just over £2 million more off the £12 million loan, with the balance as of March 31st this year now being down to £9.45 million owed by Jun 2025.

The HY accounts also show that Paul Forrest is still owed a balance of £5.38 million against the 49% SFBY acquisition.

Perhaps the failure of the SP to react positively to the May news of the successful sidetrack taking monthly production up to 3m therms a month isn't so baffling after all when set against what seems to be yet again a typical ANGS piece of failure to be transparent. I'm glad I went with the wariness my gut was telling me on this one.

Howey, I too am sure we're very much of like mind on this. I certainly share your views on the utterly spineless Cameron and the equally jaw-droppingly ridiculous, eye-poppingly self-serving and gob-smackingly amoral BoZo, but felt it was worth also highlighting the primum mobile, the root cause of the whole Brexit debacle.

Thing is, the drive towards ever-increasing centralisation is all too often (and all too blindly) considered to be an inevitably good thing. Sure there are advantages - hopefully being able to achieve economies of scale perhaps being the most obvious. However, having spent a fair amount of time over recent years having to deal with central Government, all I've seen is my experience has been huge inefficiency and massive reluctance to ever make a decision. That goes for both ministers and the bloated Civil Service apparatchik that surrounds them.

Centralisation should result in efficiencies and budget savings. However, all that seems inevitably to happen is that more and more layers of middle management are added to deploy and administer said budget savings, until these layers end up costing considerably more than any budget savings gained, thus making the whole process of centralisation entirely counter-productive.

Okay, back to ANGS. Why is the SP so stubbornly stuck at sub 1.2p levels? (Baffles the living heck outta me...)

Howey, the electorate never got an opportunity to have an issue with that. Major bullied it through a parliamentary vote by effectively making it a vote of confidence (or not) in his leadership - which got enough job-saving Tories to vote in favour of signing up to the Maastricht treaty.

It was passed by 339 to 299 - and is the worst thing this country's elected representatives have ever done to those they were allegedly meant to be "serving".

Howey, there's clearly a course taught at Eton that's specific to the school. It's called "Why the truth is not worth worrying about for the likes of us".

Re Brexit, if we're playing the Tory blame game, let me very firmly add John Major into the mix. That luminary took us from membership of the European Economic Community (an extremely beneficial thing in anyone's book... and something that the electorate actually voted in favour of joining) into membership of the European Union by signing the Maastricht Treaty, without giving the country the option of any say at all in this massive change.

That was definitely not such an obviously good idea and is the root source of all follow-on problems and resultant chaos.

IMO anyways.