The Philippines really only opened up to the rest of the E&P...

The Philippines really only opened up to the rest of the E&P world in 2005. Before that the Marcos era kicked out the US majors was followed by several coups and the accompaning instability and then a disastrous supreme court ruling that shut down both the mining and O&G sector in the late 90's.

That ruling was reversed in 2005 and allowed Nido to pick up the best permits before most companies had digested the change.

The farmout strategy as stated was to offer a significant interest in all three of their permits to a large multinational who not only had the cash but also the deep water expertise to develop the portfolio. The tricky part was to convince PNOC to also farm down their share at the same time to the same party. That was done last year with PNOC announcing that they too would farm out the jointly held permits.

The delay, imho, is the pending decision by PNOC and by the government to finalise a decision on the farminee. Government decisions in the Philippines take quarters to navigate through the minefield that is Filipino politics.

I'm not worried in the least that companies are not interested. THe majors as well as the nationals are cashed up and hunting for bargains around the world. It is extremely rare to find this much area in a proven petroleum province available for one transaction much less with the seismic already acquired, processed and interpreted.

I reckon that the top 20 shareholders representing 60% of the stock get this and will continue to ride out this period knowing the value that awaits on the other side.

Regards,
OPT