Member Info for Kando

I actually think that's credible. Lenders won't want this dragging on indefinitely. The last PUSU and shortened waiver extension implied there was pressure or at least some urgency to get it over the line by June 30th (and the Sky article seemed to validate this). Whether the FCA investigation news slowed things down or not, it wouldn't be surprising to hear lenders were again exerting pressure. If so, perhaps they know accounts ought to be publishable soon.

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"Despite the fact that the imported lNG we rely on instead has four times the CO2 footprint, to say nothing of the imported wood chips fuelling the Drax power station."

Agree with you there. I just disagree that North Sea Oil and Gas has a bright future, and fracking, imo, is most definitely not the answer. It's a flash in the pan industry as shown in America, with short well life and a dubious environmental record. I'd rather we didn't frack up our beautiful country forever for short term (3 year-ish lifespan) profits for a select few private companies and limited actual benefit to the British public and consumer. The UK would still be a price taker on Oil and Gas markets regardless, it would still be priced in international prices and wouldn't provide any meaningfully cheaper energy for consumers. But that's my take.

The wind will never stop blowing over the British Isles, and the sun will more than occasionally shine. But oil and gas is not forever. The supply of those is finite and we've already exploited the *rse out of ours. 2.7bn barrels left out of the 66bn we started with. It's not a future I'd invest in expecting to make money. Thankfully WG has diversified globally and into other energy projects and isn't quite so tethered to that one patch of seabed anymore.

"Despite the fact that the imported lNG we rely on instead has four times the CO2 footprint, to say nothing of the imported wood chips fuelling the Drax power station."

Agree with you there. I just disagree that North Sea Oil and Gas has a bright future, and fracking, imo, is most definitely not the answer. It's a flash in the pan industry as shown in America, with short well life and a dubious environmental record. I'd rather we didn't frack up our beautiful country forever for short term (

"It’s more expensive to get oil in the North Sea these days but if the government just worked with industry"

It'll take more than just government support to resurrect oil production in the UK zones of the North Sea. The vast majority of what's left in the North Sea (16bn barrels being the optimistic estimate) is in the Norwegian economic zone. The UK has approximately 2.7bn barrels in its exclusive economic zone.

"The North Sea is a spent resource? Go and just say you’ve got no clue about North Sea oil and gas and leave it there Kando."

Right back at you. If you think 2.7bn barrels out of an estimated 66bn barrels that the North Sea initially held isn't a "spent resource", then I would say you don't have a clue, even on a basic mathematically level. We have about as much oil left as Syria and Uganda, and almost half as much as Egypt and Vietnam. None of these countries you would call energy rich nations. But you seem to think the UK still is and could be on the back of the North Sea O&G. Do some research to see how credible that is.

The only way the UK becomes a credible energy superpower again is harnessing what we have great resources of... high energy density winds and plentiful seabeds.

In Britain it's generally considered good form to judge a man on his principles and actions, and not on how photogenically he eats a sandwich. We're not America, yet.

Ed's mandate is to lower electricity prices. Because of marginal pricing, Natural Gas sets the price of UK wholesale electricity prices 98% of the time. By 2030, it's forecast to set the price of electricity ~10% of the time. 90% of the time it'll be set by renewables, which have a guaranteed strike price (care of the miracle of CfDs) approximately 1/3rd charged by the average CCGT plant. Emissions reductions are a byproduct of the transition, but the first order benefits are by far lowering UK energy prices as soon as possible.

Emojis make a compelling counter-argument. Well done again Gonzo.

Unfortunately for you, the more rational majority of the British voting electorate actually support the transition to energy self-sufficiency.

"According to polling by YouGov, 61 per cent of adults in the UK are broadly supportive of the net zero mission, while 24 per cent oppose it."

Perhaps the clown emojjis might be better reserved for the 24% preferring to import all our future energy needs from Qatar, Norway and the US. It's possible to be invested in an engineering firm and not be fossil fuel ideologues.

"It sounds as if that's a political or environmental view - rather than a practical one 😊"

I'm only citing the International Energy Agency, they expect peak oil to occur before 2030 - which is like now. We've probably got a couple million bdp demand growth left, to about 105.5m bpd from the 102.6m bpd we're at. But then that's it, a slow decline from there. I would argue that justifies saying "the age of oil is coming to an end". China sold more EVs than ICE last year and it's only going in one direction, it's only a matter of time until other markets get there.

But yes, you're right, other opinions are available. OPEC for example, don't believe in Peak Oil, but they wouldn't, would they?

Https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/ace/standard/800/cpsprodpb/10F88/production/_124721596_nsta-oil-production-nc.jpg

I hear what you're saying Wily, however, 15bn is actually at the upper end of current estimates.

Moreover, Ed Milliband as energy secretary since July 2024 doesn't explain why Oil production peaked in 1999 and gas in 2001. There was 25 years of terminal decline PRIOR to the 2024 election.

Government policy can not refill the reservoirs. You could hand our drilling and extraction licences like candy at Halloween, but you'll never make the North Sea as productive as it once was, nor will it ever cover the UK's domestic demand again. So the only question is what to replace it with...expensive and volatile imports, or an upfront investment in unlimited homegrown renewable energy - from which companies like Wood Group can earn a kliving in building and maintaining. There's no sense living in the past Wily. The age of oil is coming to an end, the age of gas will go on for a while yet, but the age of cheap wind, solar and batteries is the future. If even Texas is embracing tthat reality, you know it's the future.

"they prefer investing in Africa - Mad Ed has made us less investable than Africa - that takes some doing"

Agree with most things you've posted Wily, and I know this is more from political bias than fundamental analysis PoV, but Ed Milliband has nothing to do with the North Sea simply running out of economical-to-extract oil and gas.

It will hurt to accept, especially for Aberdeen's Oil and Gas industry, but the North Sea is a spent resource. Wood's future is servicing O&G projects elsewhere, or offshore wind at home. Ed Milliband, like or not, is driving us to a future where we have to import very little to run our country, from a place where we have increasingly had to import more and more for last 20 years. It's a ideological choice of choosing to become dependent on foreign energy powers forever, or creating our own - at short term higher cost admittedly, but long term lower cost (since renewables are all capex up front, and low ongoing operating costs/no fuel costs). That's just my take. But Ed is anything but mad. In fact he's probably the most capable and ambitious minister in the Labour party today. He has owned his mandate and is seemingly getting it done.

Good for you stew, you tell 'em.

More folk who seem to think a company audits its own accounts. If you want to know how long the audit will take, ask KPMG. Blaming the BoD at Wood is like blaming the weatherman for the weather. They'll issue the accounts when the auditor signs off on the accounts, no sooner. And no, KPMG are not part of the global conspiracy of Wood BoD, Sidara, the FCA, Chelsea Football club and the Labour Party to "steal" the group for 35p. They'll sign it off when they're satisfied they've done their job. They'll be in no hurry to issue accounts that risk needing a further restatement having been rushed through.

Exactly Axel, not only would it become more complicated with competition fighting them for the most profitable parts, in the meantime the assets they are hoping to buy would start losing talent/experience as engineers/staff start looking for other places to work - that aren't insolvent/in receivership/on a negative looking trajectory. People start getting the urge to jump ship as soon as they start to realize it's taking on water. Same is true in business.

Way back when Sidara first re-engaged, the FT said - something to the effect of - they were eager to get a deal done quickly to safeguard jobs and keep talent in the business.

I still think that holds true. Sidara want the 35,000 strong body of experience, reputation and know-how that Wood represents, and they don't want to be fighting for it as scraps down the road. By then it wouldn't be nearly as valuable to them and may end up costing as much anyway.

Customers don't get to review your books before signing a contract with you. It's enough for Wood's financial department to be hosting KPMG doing the audit and Sidara with its ongoing DD (and until recently Deloitte doing their Review). They're not also busy showing the books to every prospective customer. Customers are limited to publicly available information. They don't get to do DD on Wood's accounts.

Like you've now seen, Carillon were cheerily signing £1bn+ contracts in the 6 months before the liquidators were called in. Winning contracts with customers doesn't preclude liquidity problems.

"Kando, I have plenty shares and not short. Hoping for more than 35p though for my investment."

If that is at all true you should be hoping for the Sidara bid to proceed and another bidder to outbid them. That, in my humble opinion, is the only way you see or improve upon 35p from here.

But there are many ways to see nothing from here. There are several ways to see a huge dilution via RI or D4E from here.

Companies, like people, go bankrupt in two ways... gradually, then suddenly.

Fear should be motivating you as much as greed here.

Internalize this chart:

https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/ace/standard/640/cpsprodpb/B1C6/production/_99601554_carillion_share_price_640-nc.png

Shareholders in Carillion probably thought, like you, that the contract wins were great, nothing was wrong, the company was still telling them it had a £16bn order book...Brill! Then debt covenants were breached, waivers expired, they ran out of money, lenders would lend no more and the liquidators came in... in the space of around 6 months.

WG I'm hopeful is not Carillion. The scale of the problems I'm hoping are not as catastrophic, but we don't know for sure that they are not. The company are telling us it's pretty bad, to be minded to recommend 35p for it. The key difference at the moment between Wood and Carillion though, is that there's someone seemingly intent on buying Wood, before the liquidators dismantle it and the collective skillset of the workforce are lost. That gives it value. Sidara is giving Wood a value at the moment. So I would caution against joining Ice and Graff and Gonzo and Woody and Metatron in their insane crusade to have the takeover fail. Down that path lies D4E dilution or administration.

"so hopefully the FCA may get the SFO involved"

Give your head a wobble Mick. If you're a shareholder, you're literally mad to be "hopeful" of this.

You have to be short.

Yeah that's cool and all, but for the umpteenth time...order book =/= cash flow.

Carrillion boasted of a £16bn order book in mid-2017.

On Jan 15th 2018 it entered compulsory liquidation.

Don't confuse a business earning and churning new contracts with a business being in a position to turn down a suitor offering to inject urgently needed liquidity.

That's the more apt comparison. Some here aren't able to come to terms with it and that's on them, but the ship did hit an Amec Foster Wheeler shaped iceberg, and it did start taking on water. There's currently a ship that's pulled alongside offering to save every soul on board and the captain's busy arranging the transfer lines, but some of you want to throw the captain overboard and tell the rescue ship to FO. You'd rather go down with the sinking luxury cruise liner than board the budget passenger ferry that's pulled alongside to take you to safety. Yes, it doesn't have a ballroom and the casino is a slot machine, but it has far less salt water in it.

Until we're told and shown evidence there was blatant fraud, we won't know if there was fraud. At the moment there's been "cultural failings" and "inappropriate management pressure" on accounting judgements. That's not necessarily fraud. If it were suspected to be fraud, it would likely be the SFO investigating, not the FCA.

For what it's worth, I think an FCA investigation will have been largely priced into the sp and the takeover offer. The company did after-all admit to financial misconduct via the Review it commissioned. The FCA couldn't be expected to ignore that.

Aren't there some crayons you could be eating somewhere else Metatron? Why are you here?