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It’s hard to understand how a company raises 150m in equity with a £70m mcap. This is now my concern. Will need a very large premium.

I would think both Tullow and Total would want to take over our holding. A very conservative 1$ a barrel x 2 billion barrels / our 15% is 300m dollars. Fair uplift from here.

I think the reason for the high percentage for the money exchanged is frustrating but possibly quite a clever move. If Guyana is as big as we think, it will take a lot of money to drill rapidly and develop. By now only owning 15%, ECO will be able to keep this slice. If we had 20-30%, I think we would struggle to meet money demands and end up having many highly dilutive placings. Yes, we could wait until results and sell the same percentage for more money, which would of been great. But I trust Gil and trust his judgement. This company understand their place as an oil smallcap and are fully aware money is made by being wise, not by a bull in a china shop / wild wild west frontier approach to command and conquer an oil field.

I see this as building a strong base to rise from. I3E are trading 4 or 5 times the SP no more than 7 or 8 months ago. There’s no sign of weakness.

Well the snippet of news, which is unsurprising but still news, is that they intend to start building the mine and ordering long lead items in H2 2018 and that these are only done after financing is sorted. So financing at some point in the next 4-5 months. I do believe we have a strong enough shareholders that it is unlikely they would let this go undeveloped, the money will be found. But it is at what price - will we be diluted out of any rise?

Long term still positive here, but our board made a major error recently and not their first. Great at developing a mine, poor at PR. No coincidence it was the public element of the placing that fell through.

Also pretty sure our board won't know his background, they haven't been operating in the UK market for that long. From their point of view it's just a guy known in the private investments twitter brigade giving a positive outlook on the company. Yes, I agree, we were silly to put our names with his but in the end it won't make any difference. It is still publicity - anyone with a decent hat on will know to take the podcast with a pinch of salt (positive or otherwise).

..... ( I have to say I totally agree with chrisoil on this one, if we produce 15,000 bopd it is hard to see us much under the £400m, especially as Liberator West is a drilled and defined resource).

Nextview have a lot to answer for, after all this whole decline started with them pulling out from a legally binding contract. That led to the share price falling after we had finally gathered some momentum leading into the important funding stage. I can’t help but feel our best option will be to sell Sonora. We won’t get full value, or anything like, but I can’t see how we will be able to raise money through equity now.

It’s unbelievable how this has been dropped down based on fairly limited trades. It’s been way oversold. Can’t help but think a lot of people were willing to put money in at 60p during the attempted placing. Our board haven’t liked it and said no, so what do the market makers do? Plummet the price below that point. What’s ever happened over the last few weeks it’s created a mess that will be difficult to overcome. Positive news is required on alternate funding.

Nope. Unlike most investments on aim, we have quite a clear direction and clear timeline. We know nothing will be happening apart from CPR and then the Total farm in. In the mean time we get a sneak peak due to Tullow drilling and Exonns continued development. We knew all that in March and not much has changed. (This isn’t a moan, quite enjoy the fact I know I’ve invested for next year - I.e. before the heard).

$35m was stated in the rns when the Total deal was announced. This is shallow waters and hence the $35m price tag, don’t get much for $25m offshore. Quote - “With exploratory wells offshore Guyana expected to cost circa US$35 Million, Eco's participating interest is anticipated to be approximately US$5.25 Million per well. It is therefore projected that this transaction, if fully executed, will thus provide adequate funding to meet Eco’s share of the costs to drill at least two wells on the Orinduik Block as well as recover the costs of the expanded 3D seismic survey.“ I believe we have a free carry on first drill in Namibia and we have cash. So perhaps Gil has said we have funding in place for 3 or 4 wells, but this deal is definitely only going to pay for 2 plus seismic.

All details of the deal with Total have already been disclosed - there is no free carries. Simply, ECO have been paid $1m that allows for working capital on current 3d seismic expenditure. On top of that, Total will pay $12.5m for 25% working interest. This money will pay for ECO's share (now reduced to 15%) of $5m per well - so it pays us through two wells. What happens after that, I'm not sure. I assume Total would probably just buy out ECO if drilling is a success. If not, then it will be relitively easy to get debt based funding with the results/ partners behind us and only needing to pay for 15%. I suspect the former is far more likely.

I think Total have got an absolute bargain here but realistically ECO will do very well from this. 15% of something huge and proven is very big. Drill costs of $35m per well also means it is probably within our interest to not own too much of the licence - we would find it difficult to raise large sums with our small mcap. To think otherwise, would be naive. Bod are thoroughly staying within our means and this has meant very little dilution so far and I like their prudent approach to business.

I’m more than happy if these guys are a bit delayed here and there, as with all oil companies. In general they are hitting targets - everything was pushed back due to delay in licence round. I’ve been here since IPO, initially at high 30’s and all the way to 25p. Great progress has been made since and it has been shown in the sp rise. Although most forget we were meant to come to market at 50p+. Oil price has surged since and we have far more oil, plus almost a joint venture partner. Still way undervalued and funding will be the catalyst.

Ah - just listened to this (with ears turned on) and picked up the July thing. Looks like some news will be sooner than I had anticipated, something you rarely see on aim.

You can't help but feel if we managed to agree 200m debt, rather than 150, things would be different. We are now having to raise most of the money through equity oppose to a fair(ish) split. Still encouraged by Hanwa who are ensuring they keep 10% ownership and the Oman institution are happy to stump up. These aren't mugs. You would think large private investors out there would be willing to stump up given such large institutional backing (follow the money...).

I've a lot invested here as I truely believe in it as a long term investment/ the future. Things were looking so good 6 months ago. I've definitely fallen into the trap of getting too attached here but I'm comfortable with that, investing to me is a hobby as well as a means of extra earning. Plenty other stocks for quicker turnarounds, BCN is for me trying to do something more meaningful.

What is the signifiance of 5 days left in July? The JV negotiations allow 90 days (Tues 25th September). I know that is a maximum deadline and things could move quicker but I still don't expect an announcement until end of August at earliest.

I agree with the sentiment though, not long to go in the scheme of things. Been waiting much longer in other stocks, nice to have a definitive timeframe.

We are already trading at a massive discount to npv - think we are at fairly rock bottom prices. I said at the last RNS that it wasn’t good news and it has proven to be the case. The board should have said there is an intention to raise up to 100m and it will be at 80p. If we only got 75m out of 100m then so be it. That’s how offers often work. Disappointing as even a poor offer would of at least seen us funded and almost guaranteed the further Oman and Hanwa investments. We could of moved forward but instead this will drag on. Were they not expecting funding to be announced q2/q3 2017 originally? No doubt that in this sector funding is tricky.

Iceberg - if that is the case and it is done quickly then good news.
Addicknt - I had hoped that news of the placing would of happened along with whatever the placing price was. Never like to hear the 'we're about to place' as it always leads to a sp crash and a low placement price. The fact we are placing and can raise such a huge amount is good news and I think we are around basement prices here so little downside. As I said, good price for someone to get in.

The price of this placing is going to be crucial. No wonder the market makers have dropped the price so much and so quickly. They will be the ones getting these shares and will want as low a price as possible. Not going to trade this, no point anymore. The time was a few months ago when the 125p mark fell, if you fancied the trade. Not great news today in all honesty. However, as soon as placing is confirmed and the price is set and it’s out the way (assuming 2 or 3 weeks) then we can move on as an almost fully funded company. 360m out of 460m is not bad going with the final 100m in q1 2019 (at hopefully a higher price). Feeling here is while the mcap will continue to increase the actual sp will remain stagnant, as has happened over last 2-3 years. This was always a long term one for me and holding till production. A side note - there is lots of reference in everything we do to what will happen should a takeover occur. Seems to me that this is very likely and I think it will not be a good thing for us long term shareholders. Can’t see ty price being a good reflection of the asset.

Eco seems quite under the radar but expect this to pick up later in the year. Quite nice being involved in an aim share that doesn't have to get financing or want to do dilutive placings.

Following on from below... I also just remembered that PS stated that the banks want paid back before shareholders, which he thought was wrong. He said it would take 2 or 3 years to pay them back. So when working out the cost of these loans, remember we will be paying them back quickly so won't cost the full amount indicated. It also suggests that the level of debt is high because we know this mine will be highly profitable. Two years profit could be (crudely) $210m or $315m over three years - 2.5 years as suggested, works out at $260m or roughly where I calculated debt levels on the Hanwa no dilution basis.

(my numbers are based on 4k cost and 11k sell price with a 17.5k production, as the FS but we know the sell price may be closer to 12-14k).