The Oil Man: Range, Plexus, IGas, Baker Hughes
31st October 2016 12:45
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WTI $48.70 -$1.02, Brent $49.71 -76c, Diff $1.01 +31c, NG $3.11 +4c
The meeting at the weekend between various OPEC members and other producers has done nothing to alleviate concern creeping into the market that a deal on 30 November is anything but a faint hope at the moment.
The pressure on the Saudis is significant and, with a number of dissenting voices, chances of a deal are beginning to fade. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia might, and probably will, try to keep the pressure on Russian and other Gulf states - but will it be enough?
Friday's stats were mixed, the rig count showed an overall rise of four units to 557 but oil was down two at 441, which should have been more positive.
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission numbers, however, showed that those money managers with long positions fell for the first time in five weeks.
Range Resources
More sensible financial work from this morning, as they announce a $20 million (£16.4 million) convertible loan note with LandOcean (LO) over three years at 8% convertible at 0.88p per share.
This will replace part of the LandOcean IMS agreement and LO will continue to provide Range with finance for work undertaken in Trinidad.
Range is continuing to tidy up its finances and, clearly, the relationship with LO remains strong and will help them as they push forward next year to bring onstream and finance the waterflood projects.
Plexus Holdings
It is no surprise to see oilfield services company report a loss, as it has been badly hit by the malaise in the industry.
A loss of £5.7 million (6.39p a share) was not as bad as I was expecting and the company has net cash of £9.9 million. Cost cutting has been unsurprisingly tough.
With subscriptions of £8 million by Jereh, £5 million by Gusar and a placing of £6 million to new and existing shareholders (including Chairman Ben van Bilderbeek), customers, management and shareholders have acknowledged their support this year.
With a rental business that protects against some of the vagaries of the downturn and a clearly industry-leading set of technologies, POS looks to me like it is here to stay.
IGas Energy
In further comment on press speculation, has been forced to announce that Trans European Oil & Gas, as bondholder, wants the company to sell its conventional oil and gas assets.
The company "continues to engage with key stakeholders to recapitalise the business", which presumably means some amount of equity dilution, thus making the possibility of the company remaining in its current guise extremely unlikely.
I imagine that Jim Ratcliffe is looking on with interest…
Sundry
News is slowly filtering through about the GE/Baker Hughes merger - or, as they put it, " and Agree to Create New Fullstream Digital Industrial Services Company".
The £30 billion entity might be of significance, but will likely only taint BHI with GE's non-expertise in the sector.
More interesting is the verbal jousting between /Woodside and regarding the Senegal situation. COP and Woodside have announced that their deal is to complete - which seems at odds with Far's view that they still have farm-in rights.
This is from Far's statement:
"As previously reported to the ASX, FAR believes a valid pre-emptive rights notice has not been issued to the joint venture partners by COP and FAR has invoked its right to resolve this dispute in accordance with the Joint Operating Agreement. FAR is not aware that the Government has advised COP of its approval of the transaction. FAR continues to reserve its rights..."
Seems like it's not quite over yet.
And finally…
With most of the top sides winning at the weekend, any one of about eight teams could be in the shake-up, although it is very early days. The marketing department at have a hard day ahead of them, selling us Stoke v. Swansea tonight...
Well done to Muzza for winning yet another competition; fatherhood is definitely good for him. If he wins next week and Djocko doesn't make the final, then he will become world number one.
In the cricket, England reverted to type and, after a great start, chasing 50 too many after 5 dropped catches, they fell apart just like they used to, conceding to a team of highly enthusiastic if inexperienced spinners.
If that's what they are like against this lot then the Indians are hardly likely to be shaking in their cricket boots.
And, with only two races to go, Lewis has not only got to win, but hope that Nico has a DNF (which is unlikely since Mercedes keep all of those for non-German drivers) or hope that someone else gets him in a tangle - er, Max…
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