Member Info for romaron

It reminds me of when I was a child. After swimming at High Beech we'd collect empty bottles and carry them through the forest for 2 miles and claim a deposit return from the first shop. The money then went on important things - like sweets. I don't remember boasting about it though.

The Mariner field began producing oil in 2019 and consists of two reservoirs, Heimdal and Maureen, and estimates of the resources in place had been subject to uncertainty due to a high degree of subsurface complexity.

"The reserve revision is linked to an updated seismic interpretation and experience from production of the Maureen reservoir which led to a revised reservoir model," Equinor said.

I imagine the above data is shared with EnQuest and has a bearing on other fields like Kraken and Bentley and of course Bressay where we share an interest. I know that Maureen has potential for Kraken that may be reassessed. It wasn't major but these things interlock from time to time and they're all heavy oil. For Equinor the Mariner development will affect their thinking for Bressay whilst putting pressure on the UK reliance on dwindling fossil reserves. If anything it makes Cambo more likely imo. It also brings us back to the impairment question. If 2 years down the road oil is $100+ are these reserves moved back into 2P? For me it only reinforces the dangerous path we are going down in demonising oil. I suspect there is another story going on out of the public eye.

Equinor has taken a £1.3billion impairment on the value of its Mariner field in the North Sea after a major downgrade to its recoverable reserves.
The Norwegian energy giant has revised down its estimates from the field east of Shetland by nearly 35% from 275million barrels to around 180million.

Mariner started production in 2019 after a £6.4billion investment from Equinor, one of the largest in the UK sector for a decade, and was said at the time to be able to continue producing through to 2050.

I suppose their shareholders are baying for a new Board? They also flagged a loss on natural gas derivatives of up to $1.5bn, which will also be booked into Q4 earnings report. Sh*t happens. BP and Shell have dropped some real clangers in the past. Anyway back to the real world.

As we go hunting Russian submarines it's worth remembering that the UK had the highest self-sufficiency, producing over 90 per cent of its crude oil demand. ... The UK could have met more than 90 per cent of its demand for crude through indigenous production and ranked in the top five for security of supply.

And better still gurun even you and I couldn't mess up the hedging. Going forward you can't sell at (for instance) $50 a barrel if it doesn't go below $70 for 2 years.

He sends a regular email out and today I got this:

"Dear friends,

Predicting the future is hard. The longer I've spent working as an analyst, the more humble I have become about my ability to foresee what will happen next.

Nonetheless, expectations matter. Our collective expectations about the future have an enormous impact on the economy and markets.

I would like to invite you to complete a short survey (6 questions, less than 1 minute to complete) to help understand how the informed community views the outlook for oil prices over the next five years: https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/P9L56XC

I am well aware of (and have written often about) the problems of price forecasting beyond anything other than the very short term. All I want to obtain is a snapshot of how experts think prices might evolve over the next five years, the range and dispersion of views.

Responses are all confidential. There is no fortune or glory if your expectations prove correct. There are no prizes, no league tables and no embarrassment. No one, not even I, will know what you predicted.

Please don’t spend too much time thinking about the responses. I am more interested in your instinctive view about where you think prices will be roughly in each of the next five years.

The survey is in its seventh year. Each year the survey attracts more than 1,000 responses. I will share the aggregated results and analysis in a few days.

Please take 1 minute to complete the survey here: https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/P9L56XC

The more responses, the more representative the survey will be."

I'm interested in the result even though it will prove little but you always wonder where you'll be against the average.

I won't compete but my forecast is that Juan will be about 3 months too soon so would pitch at 48.00. In truth there will be events we haven't anticipated so it is impossible to predict but at least it will highlight just how dificult running an oil company is.

*monkey - I did notice the 4 decimal points and still have no idea how you achieved that using fingers.

Hi GA - I think there is a danger of setting precedents if they had answered you any other way plus it could be construed as insider information. I don't think EnQuest are that different to other companies in this regard. They weren't being rude or dismissive but governanace forces them to behave this way. No doubt there are other people involved that aren't EnQuest employees e.g. sub-contractors but they are fully aware of the restrictions on client confidentiality and they could easily lose their job or the contract if found leaking information. The answer you got doesn't set alarm bells ringing with me. I imagine there are others here who would confirm the confidentiality clauses regarding offshore workings better than me. Maybe mrc or Londoner7?
Then there is the other side of things. You try one of a set of solutions and have to then start it up again to see how successful plus the option of continuing adjustments etc.... what I'm trying to say is that people at the sharp end will possibly say things like "we'll see if that stops it or lets hope it lasts until scheduled maintenance."
And then they'll have a surveyor or chief engineer saying things like until we get it on deck we cannot be sure but it's likey that the giggly pin is broken or the laughing choke snapped.

BTW it is only about 17 days to the update.

Hi mrc - Art Berman confuses me too but he does collect a lot of info and I find some of it it useful like break even prices. He does seem to blow hot and cold. The actual article by Ed Conway was very balanced and I was going to make the subject 'Brave Man' because anything other than total commitment to renewables attracts the usual venom from the likes of XR or Insulate Bruitain. They usually don't even read the articles first. I am seeing more balanced views in the media lately and it takes a lot to veer away from the safety of belief in the future for energy and going with the herd. In fact that is exactly what religion is based on. Salvation tomorrow. Thing is, tomorrow never comes.
What many miss is that all we need is a few years and our investment will be repaid in full. I am treating it as a kinda 10 year bond and expect a very healthy return. I am still at a loss for who will replace the majority of funds who exited the sector as I cannot see them easliy doing a volte face and for now it looks like Private Equity and PI's with a higher risk tolerance filling the vacuum.

Save your breath with Stanley. He is like a limpet to this message board with his religious zeal and insistence on proselytising his views upon us. Do what I do and don't answer the door or hide behind the sofa when he knocks.

Dunno about BBK. 2022 has only just begun and there are a lot of potential flash points to throw energy supply into chaos.

Be lucky

"An excelllent yardstick for this is steel. Whether in your car, your house, your home, your public transport systems or hospitals or schools, the quantity of steel embedded in your life is as good at illustrating economic developments as GDP statistics , if not better. If you live in Europe or the US you have, on average, up to 15 tonnes of steel in your world. In China the average is up to 7 tonnes; most people in Africa have an average of less than one tonne.
Let's say we in rich countries stop growing and keep our steel quotient where it is. Fine. But who are we to dictate that the people of Africa cannot aspire to have the same steel per capita as those in rich countries? The sting in the tail is that we still have no way of mass-producing virgin steel without emitting a lot of carbon and using tonnes of, guess what, coking coal.
Now, all of this may read like a counsel of despair, and such points have occasionally been trotted out by fossil fuel lobbyists to damn green technologies. But no: net zero is not impossible. It's just a lot more complicated than many people would have you believe. Take those wind turbines: yes, they are made in part from oil, but over their lifetime they save the carbon emissions from their manufacture many time over in the form of green energy. Same for solar panels.
In time we will, with luck, perfect truly green steel, concrete and batteries (as well as getting a lot better at recycling the old ones). But we're nowhere near that yet, and there's no point in pretending otherwise."

I find it is usually better to read an article before criticizing it.

OK Simplyme, you're in at 34.10.

Sorry Juan - I thought I'd replied. It was an oversight. Latest list:

Aloj 66.60
Juan 60.00
Mrc 56.00
Modestus 55.00
Tigar 53.10
Pelle 49.99
Oxygen 47.25
Tarmak 44.10
Therapist 43.25
Gordon Albert 42.82
Hitman 39.00
Gurun 38.00
Shax 33.00
SIPP10 32.80
Northernmonkey 28.25
Slift 27.80
Pyueck 19.50

In ST he didan opinion piece and early on wrote "And so goes the conventional wisdom in Whitehall, where fossil fuel projects - especially anything to do with coal - are so politically toxic that standing up for them is tantamount to career suicide. Even pausing before answering the questions abhove is liable to have one labelled a climate change denier."
He then went on to defend fossil fuels by explaining how integral they are to everything we do. Many feedstocks come from or rely on fossil input, especially oil and gas. An example was carbon fibre for wind turbines (the clue is in the name).
A particular interesting point was "that 2017/18 (latest data) records a drop of one million tonnes of greenhouse gas from stuff we make. Emissions from the stuff we import rose by six million tonnes. This is a shameful hole in climate politics."
Finished with "This is the practical, unpalatable reality of going green. No one much likes to dwell on this stuff. But, sorry, the more we fixate on fairytales of environmental perfection, the less likely we are to get it."
What got my attention is that it is quite a seemingly unpopular position to take but it was basically stating that emissions must go up to come back down, To be clean and green, we first need to get dirty. EC is the Sky Economic Editor and we might be seeing the weight of the Murdoch empire swinging towards fossil fuels. Even if that isn't the case there are more postings supporting the EC position appearing in print now. If the UK energy crisis worsens we'll see more. It isn't a fight back but more an acceptance that fossil fuels are essential to the transition to renewables. Cambo will be a big indicator.

The competition is now closed. If E121 or L7 want to participate they've got grandfather rights from the 2021 competition and are still eligible.
Entries are:
Aloj 66.60
Mrc 56.00
Modestus 55.00
Tigar 53.10
Pelle 49.99
Oxygen 47.25
Tarmak 44.10
Therapist 43.25
Gordon Albert 42.82
Hitman 39.00
Gurun 38.00
Shax 33.00
SIPP10 32.80
Northernmonkey 28.25
Slift 27.80
Pyueck 19.50

Don't be afraid to make suggestions. If there is a big sea change after the early Feb (expected) operations update it might be an option to be allowed an adjusted bet for instance. I hope we're not tempting fate by making a Black Swan the prize.

Entries:
Aloj 66.60
Juan 60.00
Mrc 56.00
Modestus 55.00
Tigar 53.10
Oxygen 47.25
Tarmak 44.10
Therapist 43.25
Gordon Albert 42.82
Hitman 39.00
Gurun 38.00
Shax 33.00
SIPP10 32.80
Northernmonkey 28.25
Slift 27.80

Pointless sugar-coating it mrc. Tell him what you really mean! He's a lonely troll. You've made his day. In a physical world he'd have to take notice. Nothing deters him. He may actually enjoy abuse.

Whilst here. I don't see all posts as I decided to use the Filter more rigorously in 2022 and the challenge is obviously not open to the minority that are on it. You are not on it Simplyme (01.32) but are ineligible if you won't claim the prize if successful. I'm not messing with Karma and upsetting the Investor Gods. Don't you want to be more successful with the ladies?

Following my previous post I thought I'd look up the Stock on loan with EnQuest. I use Euroclear because it's FREE but you are a month behind. https://www.euroclear.com/en.html
Click on MyEuroclear (RH Corner) on the next page go to the bottom for Monthly stock loan data.

For those too lazy - December 2021 in per cent terms
ENQ 2.07
HBR 2.86
SQZ 3.91
TLW 5.51
CNE 8.68
BP and Shell Zero.

I've made good money in the past by picking companies with a high percentage on loan but conversely I am very happy to see EnQuest at 2.07 per cent. The 3rd lowest since I started keeping a record in November 2016. In May & June this year it went to 1.86 and 1.96 but jumped to 3.12 in July. It may mean little but the lower the better as far as I'm concerned.

*In Nov 2020 PMO was 16.96. We haven't had any reportable shorts (above .50 per cent) for several years now.

Be lucky

In today's Times. I don't know a lot about HUT Group but it has handed a dossier to the FCA claiming a City 'conspiracy'. It (for me) goes into QAnon territory and no doubt if proven unfounded the CEO will say it is just another example of the City looking after its own and evidence that the conspiracy goes deeper. He particularly didn't like Numis sending a note about accounting irregularities (later retracted and apoloised) and a note by The Analyst which helped precipitate the share crash in October 2020 by suggesting sales deals hadn't closed. Shorters leapt aboard. What really stimulated this post was that what led to the collapse in Oct 20 happened the day after the company had an 'Investor Day'. This to me is similar to Trump claiming the election was a big steal. Companies think they are perfect and their plans make sense but analysts are drawn to inconsistencies and impervious to the hard sell. I actually prefer the modest approach of AB and his team. There is an element of 'careful what you wish for' here and CMDs are largely promotional and not always successful.
Well, I didn't appreciate the RBC analyst mistake or the downbeat way Barclays always valued EnQuest but I never once thought 'conspiracy'. If you're up to NO GOOD you don't put it in documents that the public can easily find. Anyway it led to this at the end of the article: "According to data provider IHS Markit, 4.1 % of THG's shares are on loan, a proxy for short-selling, where investors bet against a company's share price."
Shorters of airlines (hedge funds) have got burned in the recent surge of bookings following the easing of travel restrictions. This imo has not yet been reflected in the prices of oil producers. IAG, easyJet and Whizz all leapt about 13%. I expect steady gains from EnQuest through next week as 'the penny drops' for investors.

In December IAG stock on loan was 9.94% THG 8.72%

If you build it they will come.

I agree hitman - I think NED's need to show impartiality and it is a nominal amount for JW. A large amount could affect your judgement. That is not the case with a founder like AB. There are options to be taken into account too and some are quite lumpy. Some may well decide not to buy on principle as it could send out the wrong message or threaten their neutrality. I think it's not the amount but the message.

"Best place to find oil is in an oil field". Neil McCulloch - ex COO Enquest now with Spirit Energy

You're in GA at 42.82