US Oil & Gas – The Kilkenny Ramp, the jokes just keep on coming

Comments

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   Duck and Dive

   10 June 2014, 11:55

   Sounds like a man desperate to survive the upcoming AGM without cash or partners…or oversight.

   Some shareholders will have been dismayed to hear Brian McDonnell declare that USOP won’t be taking the pesky Tweeters and Bloggers to court after all. Apparently, USOP has better things to do with its limited time and cash.

   Effectively, he asked shareholders to give him unqualified support or feck off and sell their shares. (That’s not how a PLC works of course but it’s how Brian wants USOP to work.)

   He also explains why he keeps changing his USOP story. Apparently it’s because the data keeps changing. (Does that mean shareholders can’t even trust the RNS’s for more than a wee while?)

   Brian revealed to a stunned audience that his assembled team of crack geo and drilling consultants were costing the company $1000 per day each. And yes, they are real people who shareholders could talk to – if only USOP could afford the $60k it would cost to pay for their attendance at the AGM. (Oddly, I am unable to find any reference to these payments in the accounts despite the intensive consultancy work allegedly being done by the “expanded” team during the period. Indeed, hardly any cash has been spent on anything to do with operations – but that’s a mystery which Brian will doubtless be able to clear up at the AGM.)

   Brian was asked WTF he was doing starting up a business (GTC-Ksa) with Soran Talabani – but that was apparently just something to help Soran’s career and nothing to do with USOP. (Wrong, Brian: when you’re working 24/7 as USOP’s executive chairman, CEO, company secretary and IR manager, then any time you devote to extra-curricular business activity is of concern to the USOP shareholders who pay your wages.)

   Anyway, shareholders should probably forget about their hopes of getting an AIM listing with its greater exposure, liquidity, transparency and regulatory oversight. Brian told the Kilkenny assembly that things were OK on GXG and he didn’t want the burden or expense of an AIM listing. There’s too much paperwork, apparently, and they require too much detail. They ask ridiculous questions like where a 6-month old document came from. (Anyway, Brian said he carried a lot of the data only in his head so I can’t see AIM – or any regulated exchange – buying that.)

   I don’t know if Brian was preparing the Kilkenny faithful for non-stellar production flows but he did point out that even a 1% oil cut could sustain a commercial well. (Good job too since Eblana1’s alleged flow of 240 barrels of liquid a day included approx 98% water cut.)

   And don’t expect too much of the much-hyped “Field Development Plan”. Brian explained that the real golden key was the Master Development Plan which, unlike the FDP, would require, inter alia, an extensive environmental assessment, regulatory approval – and take over two years to put together. (FWIW, I can’t see any outside company investing in a “FDP” which might all be wishful thinking if it doesn’t come with regulatory approval.)

   In the same vein, Brian hasn’t worked out yet where the next drill will be. They’re still analysing data. It might be close to Eblana1 and it might be somewhere else entirely. (And yet, according to the recent RNS, they’ve already designed the smart well for it! How can you design a well without knowing where the drill bit is going?)

   Naturally, with almost everything still up in the air, Brian is not yet able to get funding – in fact he’s not ready to pitch for it yet because it can’t be rushed and there’s a time and a place for these things. But, of course, “funding is not a problem”. (Honestly Brian, it is a slight problem because you’re paying these boyos $1000 a day to keep giving you new daya anaysis and there are quite a few of them and you’ve got other work, like that VSP and yet another survey, which needs to be done urgently, and AGMs, auditors, lawyers, nomads etc cost a good few bob – and you must run up a helluva bill touring the world (not to mention Ireland) talking to people and welcoming them on to your patch of Nevada desert to see where their money would be going: and even on tinpot GXG, the costs are just inexorable…so, in all fairness, it probably would be a good idea to rush up a funding deal. Now is the time. Shareholders are mindful of the auditors’ stark warning in the recently published annual accounts – and really, so should you be.)

   And finally, it’s really shocking that you accuse long-standing and committed shareholders of disloyalty or mutiny because they exercise their right to offer the company a highly qualified new director to work alongside you to help move the company forward. Of course, you’re not going to run off to another company or get run over by a bus – but these things do sometimes happen and surely you must know that, as things stand, USOP would collapse without you. And it’s prudent for all sorts of other reasons that there should be another director on board to help you. So, please show your shareholders the respect they have earned: USOP is their company, not yours.

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   wildrides

   10 June 2014, 13:00

   Tom ……… please .do another Hitler video on this …….. you know you want to ……. I want to laugh until my truss breaks again !