Member Info for miles44

Https://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/home/centerx:97.133/centery:6.120/zoom:14

The West Capella drill ship has moved a little bit to the Northeast from its former position (not far) and its Offshore Support vessel is currently approaching it. Possible meaning: drilling in Layaran is done and the OSV brings new crew andsupplies for the next drilling campaign which will be Halwa (nortwest of Layaran).

Also would mean that the drilling campaign is in the estimated timeframe.

As for results: if it´s negative/dry we will hear about it in the next days - but would it be dry with them now having drilled there several weeks? If they found sth then we´ll have to wait until January or even February for any results.

That´s the way it is :) But at least marinetraffic gives us live data from West Capella :)

Didn´t understand it @Nitro182 ... why would they remove the WTF? And how genius of whom?

... " a group or money managers" ... you can also call "the group" the US government ... as I mentioned: war isn´t only fought between Russia and the West or Islam and the West .. it´s also fought in the commodity space ... just look at the huge reception given to Putin today by the UAE ...https://twitter.com/clashreport/status/1732355664272331173 ... there´s a clear front now between (most of) OPEC+ and western states ... and what we see now is the west trying to influence the oil market with the 70 % traded on paper ... so far very successfully, but the outcome is of course open

Personally don´t think so. Yes, HBR is a nice target and might be bought at some point ... But I guess Slim wants a person on the BoD as I already mentioned to get influence and also insider knowledge. He might be interested in buying a stake in HBR´s mexican assets just as he has done with Talos (he didn´t buy Talos, but (indirectly) around 50% or their Zama stake. And what better as a buyer than also sitting on the BoD of your potential seller

So while it was very easy to get the first 5.1 % of HBR for Slim (around 4.5 % from former creditors of Noble who had to buy it from them and resold it to the market in the last 3 months plus 0.6 % probably bought on the market), getting the next 5 % could be more difficult. Besides the forced selling by Noble due to their credit problems, I haven´t seen any major shareholder selling in the last months. And imho after around 2 1/2 years of continuous selling by former Premier Oil creditors, EIG, former EIG shareholders (GIC etc), we don´t have anyone currently willing to get rid of a larger package of shares ... finally I would say as shareholders have suffered for a long time and as we all have stated numerous times, the valuation of the company is ridiculously low. So what has changed now from 6 months ago? 6 months ago, HBR had to support the share price with buybacks as HBR had no relevant buyer and no interest in the company and still had to handle some shareholders wanting to sell their shares. For me it looks like the "flash crash" we saw Monday was probably the last bunch of shares held by a former Noble-creditor who sold the rest of his shares on the market in one package. This packages of shares was - as we now know - bought by Slim (clever as he is). So let´s see ... but right now the situation therefore has changed as: HBR doesn´t do buybacks anymore and doesn´t have to as there is now a substantial buyer and no more substantial sellers (at least for now and the next weeks). That already stabilizes the share price as HBR is up on a "rainy" day for oil ...

True @Stupmy - and there are doubts about the sustainability of current US production as well ... so ... I guess we´ll just have to wait and see :) As we already concluded, HBR in the shorter term needs "stable" prices at around 75 to 85 USD Brent for its M&A .... if oil would go up to 120 USD right now, it would probably kill any bargain prices for a take over ...

It will follow the natgas prices lower, I agree ... but just as some people thought gold would break out Sunday night and now wake up with all gains gone .... who knows where natty is at the end of this day ... down now - up tonight? I wouldn´t bet on it either :)

Exactly, @Kokomo ... as bizarre as it might be: the best thing for HBR right now definitely isn´t a huge rise in oil and gas prices ... but stable prices at current levels as HBR needs to finish its M&A deals for a good price before the market goes up ... until now HBR has played the market right - repayed debt, buybacks and no M&A while prices were high ... hopefully a lot of M&A in the next months and once that is done: higher prices are welcome :)

It gets more and more a fight between commodity-producing countries on the one side and Wall Street (financial markets "trading" 70 % of "oil" and other commodities on paper on the other side. Industrial countries want and neet cheap commodities whilst commodity-producing countries more and more work together in OPEC+, BRICS etc to counter this. Brazil joining OPEC yesterday and new members joining BRICS are the latest example of that economic war over commodities slowly heating up ... and oil going down after OPEC telling the world that there will be even less production and Brazil will join the quota-regime is nothing else than the US telling the other side: you want to fight for higher prices? We fight for low prices ... let´s see who will win ... one thing´s for sure though: in the long run nobody can eat, build or drive with USD ... the world needs the physical commodities, not the 70 % of electronic market "commodities" ... so the dog is physical markets and the tail ... well ... just imagine if Saudi Arabia would declare that as an answer to financial institutions shorting oil they lower their production of oil to zero (!) for the next 6 months ... would that still have the oil price sinking 3 % the same day? Probably not ... oil will follow gold and silver on the way up ... it will just be a lot more painful for industrial countries when it happens ....

Well for me the statment of "balancing" shareholder returns with investment in M&A that would have a longer term beneficial effect for shareholders between the lines sounds like they won´t do buybacks now as their "multiple M&A opportunities" have a better ROI - which is great. Buybacks are a great thing... the second best thing in fact - as long as there are no better opportunities ... and their statement tells me they don´t just have one better opportunity ... they even have the choice between several ones .. good thing and I therefore am perfectly fine with no further buybacks at the moment

You´re mostly right. Some tax was due to be payed but the majority of it was deferred - means it reduced net income to below zero (explains why the company is pumping FCF but officially is "loss making"). Also means that the income statement will be less affected by the EPL in the future. What will be affected of course is FCF. Thats why the saying "free cash flow never lies" is true ... the company was profitable in 2022, is in 2023 and will be in 2024 and beyond. And it can be seen with FCF ... "net income" can be influenced a lot by things like amortisation/depreciation/calculating future losses as "this years burden" etc etc. ... don´t get fooled by these things - neither by a low P/E ratio (doesn´t say very much if its just for 1 or 2 years) nor by the fact that a company like HBR makes a loss but in the same time creates 1 bn USD FCF ...

I suggest those with a little time tonight watch the webcast of ORCA on their website https://orcadian.energy called "pilot farm our September 23"

It would immediately add 65 mmboe of 2P reserves to HBR - around 1 year of production.

It also ties together that Linda announced that HBR is seeking for short term investment in the North Sea in 2024 to reduce the EPL... with Orcadian they would have to pay them around "nothing" ... negligable amount of money to get a lot of oil and gas in the ground and could spend a LOT of money in the project in 2024 and get 90 % back via saved tax. It would be a great idea ... not the one to diversify out of the UKCS ... but a nice one with very very low capital spending and the probability to lift their 2P reserves in a 2 years time. If I were HBR board, I would have said YES to that plan ...

"The extension is conditional on Orcadian’s submission, before November 30, 2023, of an application for NSTA consent to the assignment of an interest in P2244 to the proposed operator, and appointment of the proposed operator as operator."

So the application must even be made TOMORROW ....

... and the farm-in partner is ... ???

Plus still a probability they will announce a deal with Orcadian Energy. The deadline for Orcadian is November 30th and so far they havent announced anything. So either the anonymous farm-in partner is someone else and it will be revealed tomorrow or at the latest Thursday ... or that farm-in partner finally abstains from the deal which is improbable as ORCA´s share price today rose by 5 % ... or it will be HBR officially announcing the deal tomorrow. As the deadline for the NSTA is November 30th ... it would fit well as they would send their common application just the day before the deadline ends... and one could further ask... why else did HBR chose the 29th ...

https://www.offshore-energy.biz/nsta-ready-to-grant-two-year-license-extension-to-orcadian-energy/

On board ... and probably soon on the Board ;)

I personally think HBR will await the drilling results in Malaysia before doing any meaningful M&A as they showed in the last webcasts that they´re optimistic about finding some more gas fields and optimistic about this lifting the stock price/valuation

HBR might be interested in only buying Wintershalls part of Zama

Also, if you compare that Noble sold its stake of around 8 % mid september and half of it was bought back by the shorties, the rest may well have been bought by Slim at that time. Would explain why the share price didn´t tank after the end of the buybacks.