The messaging from politicians in Australia is seriously absurd and being sucked up by the media without any critical thinking. It si absolutely scary to believe a government will knee jerkto impose a fee, duty, tax and if they do it it will mean no industry or investment is safe and will cripple capital investment in long term infustructure be that telecom, energy, gas oil production, toll roads , any mining real estate etc etc. It is massively long term inflationary as all investment in Australia will have premium added in case govt decides your product / industry is a easy target- risk premium.. As if government aren't already creating a false biased landscape for oil gas coal etc by granting so much to enviro grants , solar etc at every level of government.. As oil investors we get that and we know a transittion is happening but govt is stuffing it up and it will be very lumpy as simply investment will not happen and like with coal power stations companies will simply decide it is easier not to invest and let assett detoriate ending output much earlier than predicted before other technology is ready to accept the load.
Should the government be taxing arms makers extraar because they are having a good run - droneshield and other listed and unlisted How about insulation installers when they made the decision to insulate homes How about school hall builders when they decided on a government pump prime How about lithium - hey they are on a roll?
So current suggested pathways for govt are Superprofits tax? Based on what number - we all know the business is scalable. STO has no taxed profits in reserve as they have no franking cedits as they are reinvesting etc etc. hell in UK on UK assets hasn't actually made many % but is reaping it in with risky offhore projects that are at higher margin that the home shores business that has high costs. PRRT - well was fiddled with in 2017 - not sure on how a change would actually work Any other?????
Oil a nd gas is a easy target and the media is doing the governments softening up awaiting the crunch when consumers ( voters) get a gas or electricity bill and can't afford fuel for cars and then it will be a trigger to tell al energy companies they can't have a margin over XX% or XX% total profit or XX% based on capital investments or .............................? Worse the govt will want the $ in current political period so they can satisfy the woke folk where as teh oil and gas investment and possible profitability is a 20 year game.
STO business decision would simply withdraw investment in Australia and put more into Alaska and PNG or buy another offhore project ro a new Aussie one with a locked in government commitment that can't be changed? STO could distribute paid up capital back to shareholders as a return of capital rather than a dividend and avoid government stupidity or do more buy backs as well with excess cash rather than invest in new infustructure. It can always borrow again if it sees something it likes to buy.
(20min delay)