Bahamas Petroleum Company PLC – Final Results for the year ended 31 December 2018

Bahamas Petroleum Company plc, the oil and gas exploration company with significant prospective resources in licences in The Commonwealth of The Bahamas is pleased to announce its Final Results for the year ended 31 December 2018.

Period and post period highlights:

• In April 2018 lodged an application for Environmental Authorisation with the Government of The Bahamas, representing a significant milestone for the Company operationally and the necessary first step toward commencing offshore field activity;
• In May 2018 signed a Confidentiality and Exclusivity Agreement with a major international oil company for which the Company received US$1 million in payments for a period of 4 months of exclusivity. The Company reiterates the view that the willingness of a major international oil company to pay to enter into such exclusive negotiations to be validation of the technical merits of the Company’s project;
• Appointed Macquarie Capital Markets Canada Ltd as an advisor to assist the Company with various corporate initiatives with the goal of securing funding for the initial exploration well;
• Post period end (in February 2019), received formal notification from the Government of The Bahamas that the (current) second exploration period of the licences had been extended to 31 December 2020, providing certainty as to the Company’s licence term, tenure and primary work obligation as it continues to pursue a farm-in or other funding solution for an initial exploration well with the specific forward work programme for 2019 and 2020 to be agreed in the coming months together with any future licence fees due to 2020; 
• Cash as at 31 December 2018 of $2.2 million – post period end raised a further $2.54m – such that BPC has sufficient working capital to maintain the farm-out / funding process, the ongoing environmental applications and necessary technical preparations for offshore field activity through the extended licence period; and
• 2018 operating loss and total loss reduced approximately 29% and 59% respectively against previous year. Significant cash saving initiatives continued during the period, including the Board agreeing to increase fee deferrals from 50% to 90%.

Simon Potter, Chief Executive Officer of Bahamas Petroleum Company, said:

“2018 was a period of progress and consolidation for the Company. Whilst we continue to be entirely focussed on securing the funding needed to drill an initial exploration well, we now have the working capital, Government support, clear and enacted legislation and an adviser in place to achieve this. Further, the surrounding industry circumstances are more favourable, with a sustained recovery in the global oil price and renewed industry interest in frontier exploration that will underpin moving this exciting project forward. We would like to thank all our investors and staff for their continued support and perseverance and look forward to reporting on further developments to you over the course of the coming year.” 

The Financial Statements for the Year Ended 31 December 2018 are now available on the Company’s website www.bpcplc.com.