PPC.L Regulatory News (PPC)

27 June 2019

PRESIDENT ENERGY PLC

("President", "the Company", or "the Group")

AGM Statement

Company update

President (AIM: PPC), the upstream oil and gas company with a diverse portfolio of production and exploration assets focused primarily in Argentina, will hold its 2019 Annual General Meeting at 11 am today at The Naval Club, 38 Hill St, Mayfair, London W1J 5NS. At the meeting, Peter Levine, Chairman, will read the following statement:

"President is focused on building a major South American oil and gas business that will deliver shareholders real value and significant upside. This process is already well underway.

2018 was a year of real progress. All the Company's operating fields in Argentina and Louisiana generated positive operating profits with our reserves position in Argentina also improving. At the year end President's net 1P proven reserves increased by 6% to 15.4 mmboe with the higher value Rio Negro assets increasing by 83% to 8.1 mmboe. The Argentine assets NPV 10 pre-tax value was US$291 million with total Group value of over US$300 million, demonstrating ability to secure better, higher value reserves.

The Company delivered on its transformational programme in 2018 and ended the year with two significant value enhancing acquisitions in Argentina including a strategic gas pipeline also under our belt. The Group is now well placed to materially expand its medium and longer-term capacity and profitability with the ongoing US$50 million work programme for 2019/20 of workovers and new wells, the first part of which has already commenced. This programme is aimed at delivering 50% exit production growth year on year and accordingly President maintains its target of a 2019 year end production rate of 4,900 boepd."

President today also provides the following trading update.

 Highlights:

· Further consolidation and expansion of President's Rio Negro strategic footprint

· Multi-well workovers progressing with five already completed and now two workover rigs in the fields working in parallel

· Multi-target drilling to commence soon initially on the newly acquired Rio Negro Assets

· Gas Production infrastructure work making good progress

· First two months of Q2 underlines the profitable progress of the Company

· New Paraguay detailed sub-surface work demonstrates promising potential from the Cretaceous basin

· Group Head of sub-surface appointment

Reunification of the Puesto Flores/Estancia Vieja Concession

The Province of Rio Negro has kindly agreed, subject to formal decree which is anticipated during the summer, to the reunification of the separate areas of Puesto Flores and Estancia Vieja fields by the inclusion in that Concession (President 90%, Edhipsa 10%) of the area situated in between those parts and formally known as part of Loma de Kauffman.

This area spans approximately 70 square kilometres with the reunified Concession now totalling some 240 square kilometres and contains sub-surface features of potential interest and a well that previously produced gas to surface. President's strategic pan-regional gas pipeline runs through the land. Post reunification the Puesto Flores/Estancia Vieja Concession will be one physical unit and this is another step in President's planned strategy to consolidate and expand its footprint and enhance critical mass in Rio Negro. No consideration is anticipated to be paid for this reunification.

A map showing the enlarged Concession, highlighting the reunification is now on the website of President at www.presidentenergyplc.com 

Workovers

The workovers of wells have now been progressing for some three months. The primary purpose of the programme is to stabilise the inevitable natural decline in production of the well stock. The secondary, but likewise important, purpose is to develop a greater understanding of the potential productivity of the reservoirs.

Five workovers, so far only in the Puesto Flores field, have been successfully re-completed and have been placed back on production. The programme continues apace and President has now added a second workover rig so that work will be carried out in more than one of its Rio Negro fields at the same time. The forthcoming wells to be addressed will be at Estancia Vieja, the newly acquired Las Bases and Puesto Prada fields, as well as continued work at Puesto Flores.

There has been inevitable planned disruption to production as the workover of producing wells continues. Notwithstanding this, it is currently anticipated that Rio Negro production will return to the 2018 end of year highs before the end of Q3 from which point production is expected to increase from the new wells. In the meantime, production from the existing Puesto Prado and Puesto Guardian fields remains satisfactory and stable.

Despite the major field work being carried out, now with two rigs, the Group continues its profitable year on year progress and significant free cash generation as is illustrated by the unaudited results for the first two months of Q2 2019 which are referred to below.

In Louisiana, it is anticipated that a workover will commence in July at the Triche well to remedy what may be a casing leak.

Drilling

It is anticipated that drilling operations will commence before the end of European summer with long lead items being ordered. The first wells to be drilled in Rio Negro will be in the Puesto Prado and Estancia Vieja fields and will be a mix of oil and gas production, appraisal and exploration wells. Las Bases will follow.

In the Puesto Guardian Concession, Salta Province it is anticipated that in the latter part of this year drilling will commence on a two well programme at the Dos Puntitos field.

In Louisiana, the results of the seismic re-processing to date look very promising and it is now anticipated that drilling operations at Jefferson Island will commence by the end of September with an initial firm two well drilling programme and further contingent wells thereafter subject to results. In Louisiana production was recentlyshut-in and production suspended due to high flood waters which have now receded with normal service expected to be resumed within the next seven days.

Further details of all drilling activities will be given at the time of commencement of each of the respective programmes.

Gas production

Significant steps have been taken to progress the plans to commence and thereafter expedite gas production at the Company's Rio Negro fields.

The first gas compressor has been ordered with letters of intent issued for two more. It is anticipated that the first will be installed and working at Las Bases by the end of September. Good progress has also been made at the Las Bases plant itself and it is anticipated that this could be recommissioned by the end of this year or shortly thereafter.

Permits have now been obtained to build the 16 kilometre new section of pipeline required to open up the Estancia Vieja field gas to its full potential where there is between 60-100,000 m3/day of shut-in gas from existing wells which is due to be supplemented later this year by workovers and new drilling.

Paraguay

President has recently undertaken detailed petroleum system and productivity studies of producing oilfields along the southern margin of the Argentine and Paraguayan Cretaceous sedimentary basin with a view to extending these known play types onto President's Pirity Concession in Paraguay.

The Extensive 3d seismic data acquired by President in Paraguay was re-studied with the specific objective of looking for prospects that best resemble the existing oilfields in Argentina, and in particular, the adjacent Palmar Largo field volcano-clastic complex.

President's previously identified Delray Main prospect is now believed to be directly analogous to the Palmar Largo volcano-clastics with similar source, timing and migration characteristics along with seismic expression. President has identified two other satellite structures which offset this initial prospect with potential in shallower cretaceous sands.

Internal management evaluations estimate an initial Pmean oil in place of 85-90 million bbls (MMBO) at Delray Main. Pmean estimates for the two satellite prospects are promising with 95 MMBO at Delray West and 45-50 MMBO at Delray South.

A short sub-surface presentation reflecting such studies is now on the web-site of President at www.presidentenergyplc.com.

With fresh eyes, President will now undertake a mature review of the results of the Lapacho well drilled by the Company in 2014. This year a new independent expert petrophysical analysis of the logs in the well, including high definition fullbore formation micromager‎, has suggested that there is inter alia some 24 metres of mobile oil in the upper Paleozoic section of that well which was the subject of an invalid drill stem test at the time.

Whilst there is no tangible news on any farm-out discussions, in any event President still plans to commence operations in Paraguay at the end of 2019/Q1 2020.

Argentina Q2 results to date

The Company continues to deliver progress with, as anticipated, the full benefits of the workover and drilling programmes to be felt in the second half of the year.

Unaudited turnover from Argentina alone for April and May is estimated to be US$8 million giving an estimated figure for the first five months of 2019 for the Group of in excess of US$20 million.

The estimated free cash generation from core operations in Argentina after all opex during the said two months period was nearly US$5 million, giving an estimated free cash generation from Argentina alone for the first five months of the year in excess of US$12 million.

Unaudited adjusted EBITDA in Argentina after all opex and administration costs for April and May in Argentina is estimated to be approximately US$3.3 million.

The above figures exclude all contributions from the Company's profitable Louisiana operations.

New Senior Management appointment

President is pleased to announce the appointment of Dr Martin Gee as Group Head of Sub-surface. This is a newly created position for the Group. Martin, who has already commenced work with the Company and from July will be based out of the Latam Operations Centre in Argentina, has extensive experience in Geoscience. He previously worked for Sibneft, Lukoil, Norsk Hydro, as well as spending four years as Head of Exploration at Imperial Energy during Peter Levine's tenure there. Martin has a PhD in Geophysics from Oxford University and a first class BSc in Earth Sciences from Cardiff University.

Summary

The reunification and thereby extension of the current Puesto Flores/Estancia Vieja Concession is further evidence of President's successful focus on consolidating and growing its critical mass in conventional hydrocarbons in the Nequen Basin. The Company is most grateful to the Province and to our respected partners Edhipsa for their understanding and kind cooperation in this regard

President continues to make encouraging progress in its stated objectives with the significant and challenging capital work progressing simultaneously on many fronts. The fruits of this work are expected to be seen in the latter part of this year.

Glossary

Boepd means barrels of oil equivalent per day

MMBO means million barrels of oil

Adjusted EBITDA has been calculated in line with the approach used in the Annual Accounts for y/e 2018

Pmean oil in place means the mean original oil in place resource estimate

Contact:

Dr Martin Gee

Dr Martin Gee, PhD in Geophysics (Oxon), BSc in Earth Sciences (Cardiff) Group Head of Sub-surface is the qualified person who has reviewed and approved the technical information contained in this announcement

Notes to Editors

President Energy is an oil and gas company listed on the AIM market of the London Stock Exchange (PPC.L) primarily focused in Argentina, with a diverse portfolio of operated onshore producing and exploration assets.

The Company has operated interests in the Puesto Flores, Estancia Vieja, Puesto Prado and Las Bases Concessions, Rio Negro Province as well as in the Neuquén Basin of Argentina and in the Puesto Guardian Concession, in the Noroeste Basin in NW Argentina. Alongside this, President Energy has cash generative production assets in Louisiana, USA and further significant exploration and development opportunities through its acreage in Paraguay and Argentina.

The Group is also actively pursuing value accretive acquisitions of high-quality production and development assets in Argentina capable of delivering positive cash flows and shareholder returns. With a strong institutional base of support, including the IFC, part of the World Bank Group, an in-country management team as well as a Board whose interests are aligned to those of its shareholders, President Energy gives UK investors rare access to the Argentinian growth story combined with world class standards of corporate governance, environmental and social responsibility.

This announcement contains inside information for the purposes of article 7 of Regulation 596/2014