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Don't buy into the Saffron hype. The City's No 1 oil analyst warns HERE
It can be difficult just buying and holding a share at times, especially when nothing is really happening with the share price and many of its peers are seeing large rises. You could of course argue that you should have picked one of those instead and that you’ve made the wrong choice, but if your original decision was backed by the fundamentals, and nothing has changed on that front, then often the best thing to do is just to wait, or even to add more. That very much seems to be the situation with SDX Energy (SDX), a company where I hold shares myself and have been adding more recently. The share price has been bouncing around the high 40p to mid 50p range for months, and has been unable to breakout even when there has been positive news. But for me it now looks even cheaper than when I originally bought in last autumn, as the fundamentals have actually improved a fair bit. It has had a number of successful drills recently, with wells being put straight into production and adding significant amounts to daily production. Alongside that we also have higher oil prices coming into play, which should make its operations even more profitable, plus gas prices in Morocco for the domestic market which SDX serves are strong and there is surplus demand.
Sherlock Holmes fiend Rodger Sargent tries it on with a blockchain spoof at Stapleton. Read HERE
Whilst the gas in Morocco has plenty of potential, a lot of existing production – as well as upside potential – comes from its operations in Egypt, with North West Gemsa, where it hold a 50% interest, averaging over 4,500boepd. This field also makes up a decent chunk of the 2P reserves – they stood at around 3 million boe net at the end of 2016, from a total 0f 9.3 million attributable to SDX, and we should soon get an update for the figures as at the end of 2017. Gemsa is expected to continue to produce at a similar rate during the coming year, and with operating costs of just $8/barrel and its oil selling at just a 10% discount to Brent, it should generate good levels of net cash flow. Its other producing field in Egypt, Meseda (50%), had been producing around 3,300boepd gross in the first half of 2017 before facility upgrades were carried out, but with the additional work planned on that field, we could see that figure double. This field also still has plenty in the way of 2P reserves to extract – 10.9 million barrels, as at the end of 2016. There is also plenty going on at its 55% owned South Disouq gas field, and it is hoped that production will get underway in the first half of this year – although that is dependent on negotiations with the government over gas prices. The development would initially target at least 50 million scf/d (gross) and would be directly connected to the nearby national gas pipeline. Currently the company only realises just over $1/mcf though for its gas, which is a fraction of what it gets in Morocco. There is also large potential upside from further exploration at this field, as current gross contingent resources stand at 227Bcf, with an additional 11 million boe. It would also be quite easy to bring these resources online as and when they are proven up, as not only is there a gas pipeline, but also ones for oil and condensate.
Bowleven – hang on tight! says Nigel Somerville HERE
In Morcco, the drilling campaign at its Sebou field (75% working interest) has been producing some good results – KSR16 tested at 8.43MMscfd; 7.52MMscfd for KSR15; and 6.4MMscfd for KSR14 and the wells are being put straight into production and the company is on track to meet its targets from this licence for this year. That being daily gas sales of 10-11MMscfd, as current infrastructure does limit this – there is no local or national grid in place - but new customers are being added all the time. That would compare very favourably to the current situation which has been averaging 5.5MMscfd at a price of around $9/mcf – and not only would that double, but a MOU is in place with Porcher to increase the price to $12/mcf for a five year period. In terms of this infrastructure in general, things have moved very slowly in recent years, but there now seems to be a renewed urgency from Morocco to become more self-sufficient in terms of generating its own energy in the future – currently a lot of its energy is imported. For instance, a proposed $4.6 billion investment in a natural gas plant is now looking more likely to actually go ahead. Whilst this doesn’t directly affect SDX at this moment in time, it does point to the likelihood that money will be spent on more infrastructure in the future, which would certainly help to solve the problem of actually getting the gas produced to customers, and increasing sales at the same time.
SDX is already in the unique position of owning 75% of the only privately owned pipeline in Morocco at the moment, and you could argue that more infrastructure would reduce that commercial advantage. But it is also restricting what the company can sell, and given that a lot of supply currently comes from very expensive bottled gas, I don’t see it as having a negative impact – plus it is still some way off and I would expect SDX to be a much larger company by that stage anyway, based on the progress it is making. There is plenty of exploration upside as well – over 12Bcf of unrisked gas potentially – although the recent drill at Gharb Centre, ELQ-1, produced a disappointing result. That drill location was based around old 3D seismic data, and the company is now in the process of getting new seismics shot to better identify future drill locations. So as you can see, not only is the company already selling oil and gas, but it also has the potential to increase production rapidly at a time when the price, and the market in general, is stronger.
Three Shares I Will Sell Soon says Malcolm Stacey HERE
At the current share price of around 50p to buy the company is valued at £100 million, and I would argue that the current financial situation supports that. For a start the company had nearly $58 million working capital available at the end of 2017 – with over $30 million of that being cash – and is debt-free, plus it is generating cash flows in the region of $2 million per month. The latest results for the quarter up until the end of September 2017 showed that the company made $10 million revenue and recorded a net profit of $4.4 million, but a lot of that is down to adjustments made as a result of the Circle Oil asset acquisitions. I would be more interested on how the company performs moving forwards, and how the capital expenditure on drilling and improvements to its fields that is has been making translates into increased profits in the future. In terms of the share price and lack of movement, I suspect that there is a background seller and has been for some time, as any sort of rise and volume seems to result in larger blocks being dumped. But I’ve seen this before on many other shares, and when that selling pressure does finally clear, it is often accompanied by a nice rise. There is still risk here, but I believe that the growth potential moving forwards is sufficient to justify a higher market valuation than the current one, so I will remain invested for the longer term unless something fundamentally changes.