Member Info for romaron

Hi Zippy, mentioning Alma Galia reminded me we still have EnQuest Producer on warm-stack. Why?

Here's my amateur's view. Delek think it's an opportune time to raise some funds and reduce debt - call it an equity release of sorts if you like. The book-runners, banks and assorted advisers fluff up the offer and hope for the best. It was supposedly oversubscribed so is the slight dip just a result of the weakening prices yesterday? It is though an excellent referendum on the prices of medium sized UK oil producers and we should follow the Ithaca movement closely.
There are always people running slide rules over companies and making peer comparisons. The difference between them and us is we're not for sale (at least publicly). I'm sure that should we get an approach you'd see our price shoot up but the structure of the company with AB holding such a strategic percentage of stock (+ Employees Benefit Trust) make that unlikely.
We will remain wallflowers until revelatory figures are released and confirmation that debt is down. I cannot imagine AB sitting on his hands for too long and do expect M&A to occur in the not too distant future. I also expect improvements in technology, especially AI, to help us understand the two huge heavy oil fields, Bressay and Bentley, we have large interests in. Capex may have stood still but oilfield service companies like Schlumberger will continue to improve and would have been working extra hard when the price of oil was lower. There is plenty that can be done in the lab and working on logs. Drilling techniques continue to break barriers. We'll know more about BB and have better techniques to lift oil than even last year.

obviously couldn't resist the recent strength of Energean. The performance of abrdn has been poor of late and we would have been one of their outperformers. It's nice to have a reason for a dip rather than something you have to guess.

That's how they pronounce it in the US where English is a second language. This is very informative: https://www.thegreatsimplification.com/episode/44-art-berman
The conversation is over an hour long but still fascinating. It explains the importance of diesel and why a barrel of oil only tells part of the story. The oil industry is multi-faceted and complicated. If you took ESG away we'd be much, much higher and this conversation helps towards understanding EnQuest's ridiculous valuation.
What this post is about though is the difference between light and heavy oil. The movement towards EV's will reduce the demand for light (gasoline) whilst the need for diesel (heavy) is more or less unchanged. We know it'll take decades for both but the market reacts as though it will happen next year but it is what it is.
Diesel is the haemoglobin of the industrial economy and there is nothing presently to really replace it. Forget bio-diesel as it is very corrosive and more expensive with less energy density. Diesel is used to mine minerals, power shipping, trains and many other uses. I don't see diesel following gasoline at the same rate of redundancy.
What is exciting me is the possibility that Bressay and Bentley [BB] are becoming more valuable as time goes on. I know that Iran and Venezuela have enormous reserves of heavy oil but have suffered from under investment and international sanctions. That won't change overnight.
The reserves of BB are large and essential for growth and retaining the standard of living the West enjoys. Sensible Governments ignore much of the noise and look a few years down the road. The importance of BB for security and strategic reasons is far too important for it to be left a stranded asset. On top of that Bentley oil has already been lifted and sold. We are literally sitting on a gold mine (alright, oil mine). I think Equinor know full well the value of Bressay and the importance of having EnQuest as a partner. As an afterthought the difficulty of finding trained personnel might be easier for a company with extensive contacts throughout Malaysia and a reputation for philanthropy through education.

We just need permission and funds to build it. They will come.

Hi Zippy - you jumped the gun a bit there (09:18). I think 80p is more like it using my rudimentary accountacy skills.

I wrote to IR about the 9X shibboleth. Their response makes sense to them IR) but not the man in the street. If there was any truth in the quote other than a brief overshoot "the free market economy would have diverted capital to renewable projects some time ago…"
Fair enough. We know it isn't true but if a lie is repeated enough time (a la Trump) it gains acceptance. I shan't stop until the lie is withdrawn or more likely they stop using it.
A journalist was arrested at a juststopoil protest today and held for 5 hours. My sympathy is limited even though my own daughter is a journalist. In an LBC 'talk in' a lorry driver was dismissed when he complained that he'd been arrested too and held for 5 hours in his lorry on the motorway. My sympathies were with the lorry driver. It was wrong to arrest the journalist but please have some balance. We're not in Egypt or China where torture is an added refinement to imprisonment. The only torturing I can see is to the hundreds of thousands 'arrested' by juststopoil and imprisoned in their vehicles.
Maybe I'm wasting my time as juststopoil seem to be alienating support all by themselves. A hard core of 150 none of whom seem to have a job and many are quite old to be 'students'. I suppose they feel justified to stop us going about our business and paying the taxes that pay their benefits. I don't!

Currently trading at c. £2.28. Conditional trading, whatever that means, from today with formal admission and unconditional dealing from Monday. Expected to top 76,000boepd in the coming months. It was oversubscribed so I suppose we need to wait a few days to see where it settles. The take up by Israeli and US investors is an added complication but it is the newest peer for valuation purposes of EnQuest.

I heard it again today on LBC. Sam Johnson of juststopoil "renewables are 9X cheaper than fossil fuels". Didn't get past the gatekeeper (producer).
Later they had Dr. Graham Buss representing juststopoil and I got past the producer but didn't get on. He calls himself a scientist and worked for Shell for (I think 29 years) but isn't considering returning his pension or donating it to a climate fund. He was evasive and lacked solutions. One caller asked what he would do in hospitals to replace syringes. He replied that you cancel oil and human ingenuity will find a solution. I think it used to be called alchemy.
The organisation of juststopoil relies on dedicated people without jobs or who are in early retirement. A lot of empty days. The same type who hand out leaflets in the high street with a bible in the other hand. They exist because the right to protest is sacrosanct and I agree. What I don't agree with is stopping working people and the rest of us going about our usual business and leisure. The majority have rights too.

Hi AOK - Europe’s going to pay whatever these producers ask...If something unexpected happens, the price will go very high, very quickly.” -- Benedict George, Argus Media
That's a tweet today and is meaningless really but there is an element of truth in it. I think the midterms have kept a lid of sorts on the price of oil (SPR especially) and we don't know what demand there will be for the rest of this year and 2023. Then we've had COP27 and the forthcoming budget with an update by EnQuest on the 24th. I think we need them out of the way and we'll see how the cards have landed. And that's without mentioning Russia and China.
I'm hoping htis board is lively from the end of the month. We shall see.

"World’s worst greenhouse gas escapes from giant Scottish wind farm" EnergyVoice - as usual the headline is worse than the actuality and just another example of how the news is delivered. More worrying is that it was 5 months ago and we're only hearing about it now. I hope they ask Ed Miliband for comment.

"The sulphur hexafluoride (SF6) escape – the most damaging to the world, according to the US Environmental Protection Agency – happened five months ago, with industry workers blowing the whistle on the incident to North Sea trade unionist Jake Molloy of RMT.
The 1 gigawatt (GW) wind farm is owned by SSE (49%) and TotalEnergies (51%) with the substation managed by contractor Petrofac.
SF6, a synthetic gas, is almost 24,000 times more dangerous as a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, according to the UK’s Health and Safety Executive.
It is frighteningly persistent, with an atmospheric lifetime of 3,200 years."

Juan - I guess some people don't think that climate change, juststopoil or COP27 for example affect the performance of our investment in EnQuest. We even have environmentalists attaching themselves to this message board and they are welcome even if I decide to ignore them. And of course the trolls and stalkers who I ignore too. Their arguments are full of cant and dogma so excuse me if I attract them but I shan't engage with them. There are more interesting ways to waste time.

*some people think it odd that I carry a door handle around with me - but it gets me out of the house.

I'm not insisting I'm right spin. More a case of the environmentalists are overegging the danger. I'm sure that like me you learned Newton's 3rd law at school. The climate activists ignore the benefits of fossil fuels and how many have been lifted out of poverty. Europe and the US emission reductions are cancelled out by China and its coal stations. Maybe the activists should demonstrate there?
I read that an outpost of ****nal supporters are threatened by rising seas but on the other hand are top of the Premiership. https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20161213-the-350-islands-set-to-disappear If they lose their islands the people of Sandwich in Kent may benefit by reopening their port which is now a mile from the sea (cinque ports).
I quite like the comment of Gary Smith the GMB Union leader. He urged Labour to stop kowtowing to the "bourgeois environmental lobby". juststopoil were only 3 miles from me today. Luckily I didn't have a hospital appointment or flight to catch - many did.
It is a British trait to respect others, negotiate and meet in the middle. That apparently doesn't apply if you are in a cult or are convinced you're right and the majority are wrong. Behaving like religious fundamentalists isn't a vote winner. I'm with the majority in that I want to protect my standard of living and won't chase impossible ideals. Realism and events should do the trick for us here at EnQuest.

Build it and they will come.

Hi mrc - the crux is though that they are lying to the public. I think that to some extent the climate activists are in a hole and keep digging. Exaggerating the costs and problems weakens their case; it doesn't strengthen it which is what they think they're doing. Once exposed they will then have to try and repair the damage. Remember "An inconvenient truth". It works both ways.
COP27 presently is just less developed countries vying for handouts by blaming their misfortunes on the West. I have a few issues myself with the Viking raiders and slavery by the Roman Empire. I'm after reparations but will accept a pint from Pelle and Tarmak at the 60p party in lieu. Negotiations with my wife continue.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/nov/06/egypt-cop27-climate-surveillance-cybersecurity

juststopoil didn't bother either. If they glued themselves to anything the authorities there might just cut off their arms off. Far better to protest in a warm and safe environment. Pussies.

My head hurts. This looks germane: https://www.nordpoolgroup.com/en/Market-data1/GB/Auction-prices/UK/weekly/?view=chart

If you look at week 27/28 when the carbonbrief report came out you get the original calculation (4X in link) and this was a little premature as they missed the peak of 500 in week 34. Still, you have to admire their chutzpah. Don't spoil a story with accuracy.
We are now somewhere in week 46 but the last week on this chart is something like 100.
So 9X should be replaced by something like 2X.

Am I warm?

Sorry to bang on about this but we should all be doing something about fake news especially if it affects our hard earned savings. My daughter was recently on a panel with Hema Budaraju of google and Kang-Xing Jin of Meta discussing lies and misinformation in the media. What came out was that even when there is a correction (a rarity in itself) the HEADLINE remains. That is what sticks in people's minds and "renewables 9X cheaper than fossil fuels" is a perfect example. Donald Trump is the grand master of BIG LIES. It is too complicated for any interviewer to disprove at the time and it gets an acceptance that is strengthened every time it is quoted [twice on Sunday to my notice but you can multiply that many times].
I imagine that it is an imperfect equation anyway and as difficult as nailing jelly to the wall but I'm afraid I don't have enough data, access or access or ability to prove or disprove the quote. We know fundamentally it is wrong because if it was correct then our electricity bills would be much lower.
I will write to Dominic Lawson because he might take an interest and I have already contacted IR. Somebody out there must have an unbiased answer to either accept or rebut the claim that on Sunday Ed Miliband and the Green Party both quoted that "renewables are 9X cheaper than fossil fuels". It is obviously concerted e.g.
https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/offshore-wind-in-the-u.k.-is-9-times-cheaper-than-fossil-fuels
https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-record-low-price-for-uk-offshore-wind-is-four-times-cheaper-than-gas/

Time for the fight back. Slogans and banners belong in the playground.

Any help will be appreciated.

Extracts; Leaders of China, India, Australia, Canada, Russia – not going to COP27. He suggests they are less than fully committed. Even Greta’s not going but was in UK recently to promote her book and explain to her acolytes that the climate crisis has its roots in “******, oppressive extractivism”.
The car industry is hurt by this because they’re abandoning ICE following pressure whilst China blithely powers future EV’s with coal.
The late chief scientific adviser to UK’s energy dept. calculated that to meet all our domestic energy requirements, it would be necessary to cover half the land mass of the British Isles with turbines. Even that wouldn’t work because of intermittency, laws of physics and battery technology and cost.
German Govt. has authorised the removal of a wind farm to facilitate a coal mine. RWE which owns both said: “We realise this comes across as paradoxical. But that is how matters stand.” Ten days ago BASF the country’s biggest chemical company said it would have to downsize “permanently” in Europe.
In the UK to generate the same amount of energy over 20-25 years as a five-acre, ten-well shale gas site you would need a wind farm 725 times the size, this is an example of politics conquering reason.
No one seemed to pay attention to Gary Smith leader of the GMB Union (the union whose large donation to Labour was cancelled out, in effect, by one from a renewables energy firm): “What’s your message to workers in the vital chemicals manufacturing sector who depend on imported fracked gas as feedstock for the industry?” He also urged Labour to stop bowing to the “bourgeois environmental lobby”.
Too late: that’s taken over policy across Europe. It’;s only the rest of the world that understands what makes economies grow.

*did you know the average age of a miner in Africa is 8 years old? [I made it up but then so do juststopoil and Ed Miliband]

Sky had on Adrian Ramsay of the Green Party who repeated the 9X canard. This is the danger of quoting a number that was briefly touched when all (their) the stars were aligned. It is the equivalent of us quoting the price of WTI in April 2020 to support an argument that WTI is now $120 higher and using that to support an argument or some of the tops and bottom trading that some posters brag about. They must be challenged.
At the last auction of wind power (7 July 2022) it went for something like £46 per megawatt hour. The price of Dutch front end natural gas (NG) was €120 per megawatt-hour in early November, remaining well below their summer peak of €339. We know there is an anomally whereby electricity prices are charged at the marginal price of gas. They are playing on this pricing mechanism which is being changed (it's what WFT was designed for he says jokingly). I realise there will be some slippage between the price of natural gas and to turn it into electricity but I'm sure I'm as much in the dark as Ed Miliband on the exact pricing. They play on our ignorance by using a half-truth. Sure renewables are cheaper than fossil in producing electricity in the UK on sunny, windy days but NG prices go down as well as up. On Friday natural gas was $6.4701 and I can remember it between $2/3 for many years. In fact NG is presently about 5 times cheaper in the US than in Europe. It is all over the place.
We could have NG at the same price as the US (shale) but we are politically against economic growth.
Someone should pull these people up when they quote a number out of context or where it once was briefly.
It shouldn't really impact on EnQuest anyway as our reliance is mainly on oil but I'm sure Ineos could explain to EM why NG is an essential feedstock for many products we rely on including FOOD (fertiliser). It is their mission to conflate and weaken this country to take us back to agrarian times and live like the Amish.
A simple question next time the 9X quote is used is to ask "what is it today?".

Of course I had to watch the interview "Sunday with Laura Kuensberg" who had Ed Miliband on; the Shadow Secretary of State for Climate Change and Net Zero. He is hopeless and has no shame about promoting lies. Ignoring emissions he has doubled down on his claim that "renewables are so much cheaper than fossil fuels". I thought that was bad enough but later in the interview he stated "solar and wind power is 9X cheaper than fossil fuels".

He needs to be nailed on this. The ERoEI and the demonisation of the industry plus Russia wasn't discussed. The narrative is changing but he would collapse in front of real economics. He needs to be publically denounced.

COP27 is coming under increasing attack and LK called it "a talking shop". Ed promised to bring up the case of the British human rights activist Abd el-Fattah who is on hunger strike in a Cairo jail. He was convicted on spurious charges of 'spreading false news' in social media posts. Ed won't notice the difference in the way we treat the same thing in the Uk. "9X cheaper" give me a break and what about all the other things gas and oil are used for?

*don't trolls and stalker get up early.

I was watching the France v Australia Rugby and noticed the name Santos on the Australian shirts. They are a leading O&G producer. Just imagine the outcry if the English Premier League (the other EPL) allowed BP, Harbour or EnQuest to do the same? I did check out Ineos and they own football teams in France and Switzerland and their name is displayed on the team shirts.
So the attacks continue on O&G so I wondered what was socially responsible when it comes to our national sport.
Main sponsors of EPL
Gambling 8
Financial Services 5
Airline 2
E-commerce - car retailer 2
Telecom 1
Software 1

40% of the teams have a gambling company as shirt sponsor. The 2 airlines are based in the Middle East. I get quite confused by the hypocrisy and double standards. I missed Ed Miliband on Kuensberg and caught only one bit where he said China doesn't matter. I hope labour keep him. He's a walking disaster.