29th Jun 2015 07:14
LONDON (Alliance News) - Petroceltic International PLC Monday reported a significantly wider pretax loss in 2014 after it booked impairments and wrote-off its exploration costs and said production in 2015 will also be significantly lower.
The oil and gas company reported a USD272.0 million pretax loss in 2014, wider from the USD18.8 million loss in 2013 after revenue fell to USD157.2 million from USD196.7 million and it booked substantial impairments against its assets and wrote-off its exploration costs.
Petroceltic did not book any impairments in 2013, but in 2014 this totalled USD83.4 million and was related to its Egyptian and Bulgarian assets, whilst exploration write-offs came in at USD183.4 million compared to USD36.7 million a year earlier and were attributable to operations in Egypt, Kurdistan and Romania.
"In 2014, the group delivered on its production target and generated USD157 million of revenue from oil and gas sales," said Chairman Robert Adair. "Exploration results were challenging and the group's losses for 2014 reflected a write-off of unsuccessful exploration and an impairment charge to reduce the carrying value of producing oil and gas assets."
Production for the year totalled 22.5 million barrels of oil equivalent per day, of which 19.3 million barrels came from Egypt and the balance coming from Bulgaria. Petroceltic said it plans to produce between 14 to 15 million barrels of oil equivalent in 2015.
Net debt fell to USD153 million from USD246 million, and the company proposed issuing up to USD175 million of three-year secured bonds "in line with the group's long term strategy," it said.
Petroceltic invested USD109 million in capital expenditure during 2014 and has a "relatively active exploration and development programme" scheduled for 2015, with forecasted capital expenditure of USD167 million, with USD79 million of this to be carried by Sonatrach pursuant to the terms of the Algerian farm-out agreement completed in July.
Some of that planned exploration expenditure could be reduced if the farm-out initiatives currently under way are successfully concluded, the company said.
"In 2015, the company is focussing its efforts on its core assets and away from high risk or low graded exploration. In difficult industry times, the ability to adapt is critical to succeed and we continue to focus on project delivery with a constant view towards increasing value for shareholders," said Chief Executive Brian O'Cathain.
Petroceltic shares were down 1.4% to 107.00 pence per share on Monday morning.
By Joshua Warner; [email protected]; @JoshAlliance
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