I feel it is difficult at this point in time to dismiss the STO...

I feel it is difficult at this point in time to dismiss the STO offer as unreasonable. The fact is '3P' is not a guarantee of reserves. The overall reserve position could in fact be reduced.

It seems many agree that ESG management is ordinary. If you have little confidence in management, how can you believe the reserves are significantly higher?

I must say I have given them the benefit of the doubt and expected them to have a strategy in place (with STO) to deliver shareholders an acceptable outcome through a much higher 3P upgrade for which STO agreed to play 50c per gig.

Instead, what we have is management looking for STO to get them out of a hole.

There is a chance that eventually an upgrade may come along. However, it seems this is a long way off and ESG do not have the expertise or cash to actually deal with it. So today, STO have made a reasonable offer.

Who knows, maybe other significant shareholders forced ESG into this position as they also lacked faith in the direction of the company. It seemed to me that they chewed through an exhorbitant amount of cash and it would only be a matter of time before they returned to the market.

These r my thoughts. As you can see, no reserve upgrade has really annoyed me.