Well, good morning, everybody, and thank you for joining this meeting. I'm Simon Thomson, CEO of Capricorn, and with me are Rahul Dhir, CEO of Tullow, and James Smith, CFO of Capricorn. We've got a presentation to run through with you this morning, and we'd be very happy to take questions at the end. It is being webcast, so if you do have a question, please state your name before asking it. This is a very exciting day for both companies, as we announce our intention to combine in a merger of equals to create a leading African energy company. Our view is that this merger creates a compelling investment proposition built around scale, focus, growth, and returns.
In terms of scale, the combined group, which will have a new name, will have a significant one billion barrel resource base, and it'll produce around about 100,000 barrels equivalent per day net. That'll be from a material and diversified resource base across the African continent. That brings me to the next one, focus. We will have a focus on Africa, where we are well-positioned to build on our successful joint heritage as companies who have been involved for many years. Growth. In terms of growth, we will have the financial flexibility to invest in, and importantly, to accelerate, the growth within our portfolio. We'll also be able to take advantage of, further accretive opportunities as they arise because we'll have the financial flexibility to do so.
The focus very much in the first instance will be on our own portfolio because we've seen so many opportunities there to access near-term growth. Returns. We will have a transparent and disciplined returns framework. There's a base annual dividend of $60 million, and additional returns will be driven by a disciplined approach to capital allocation, which I think is very much the hallmark of Rahul, and I hope is recognized as the hallmark of James and I as well. Very much a shared vision in that respect. Look, as responsible and highly experienced operators, we're targeting 2030 for net zero Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions, and we've got a clear pathway to be able to achieve that.
In addition, we want to be an enabler for the just transition for our host governments in Africa as they seek to develop their natural resources, for economic and social development. With that summary, I'll hand over to Rahul.
Great. Well, thank you, Simon. I think it is a momentous day indeed. You know, it's like just over the past few weeks. I think our respective teams, advisors, they've all worked very hard together very collaboratively on this project. For me, it's been fantastic to reconnect with Simon. I think we've known each other for, I don't know, 16, 17 years.
Yeah.
James, actually known each other for longer than that, and many old colleagues and friends. Really, as Simon said, we've come together with a shared purpose which is really to focus on the responsible resource development in Africa. It builds on the kind of combined history of the two companies are delivering value to our host nations. I think the foundation of the combined group is around some very structurally advantaged assets. That will deliver about 100,000 barrels a day expected this year. It's a low cost of approximately $12 per barrel of oil equivalent. What the benefit of that is it's a low cost, which means you get high margins, cash flows, even at low prices.
The resource base that underpins these assets, and this is key really, that provides a very material pipeline of short cycle, high return opportunities. I'll talk more about that. These drive very visible growth. The entire capital program, okay, this is also key, is self-funded. With a strong balance sheet, we have the ability then to leverage this to also further accelerate, as Simon said. Interestingly, you know, from my perspective, the group has a deep expertise which is really combining a very strong onshore operation with offshore. I think that balance of the experience and the skills is quite critical as we look to maximize the value from the existing opportunities that we have, but also, as Simon said, to look at other opportunities.
Now, I think it's not surprising, kind of given the strong overlap of the board, of the group and the corporate functions, in the UK, we've already identified synergies of $50 million. At the same time, we don't expect any impact on our operations or organizations, across Ghana, across Egypt, Gabon, Côte d'Ivoire or Kenya. I think James will explain this better, but with a stronger balance sheet, and cash flow generation, we'll be able to optimize the capital structure better. That helps drive down the cost of capital, which is quite key, in the environment we are in.
Naturally, I think if you have a stronger and more resilient business, we're better placed to deliver more value for our host nations, more impact for host communities. Now, again, I come back to your point that Simon highlighted, which is that both the companies have a deep commitment to environmental stewardship, and the combination obviously reinforces that commitment. I think it's further driving us to improve the environmental performance of the combined group. So I think, you know, our view is that this offers a very compelling but also very unique proposition, because there isn't anything else like this. Maybe I think to substantiate that point, scale and trust, but I'll explain to you why I take that. Let me start maybe just an overview of the resource base for the combined group.
A 1 billion-barrel resource. This really kinda illustrates the point that Simon made about scale and diversity of the resource base. As you can see, the resources, West Africa, North Africa, East Africa. When we say it's a leading African energy company, the resource base certainly underpins that. It's also the scale of that illustrates the very significant organic growth potential. I think there is benefit from, on the production side, from diversity as well. You can see the production that is 2P Reserves or production, both in terms of geography, but also in terms of oil and gas. As you see, about 76% of the production is liquids and the rest is all gas. Now, importantly, Ghana will continue to be at the heart of the combined group.
As you can see, with over 60% of the 2P reserves, but also underpinning some very visible growth in both production and cash flows. I think the production from Egypt, which is stable, Gabon, Côte d'Ivoire, I think that provides additional growth, but also provides a diversity, so from a risk mitigation point of view. We've got a significant resource in Kenya, which is discovered. I think some of you have heard me talk about the work that we've done in terms of creating a very compelling development plan there, which is robust at low prices. We're making good progress on the farm down, and we'll update that in due course. I think critically, these are long life, low cost assets, I think as I said to you.
Let me perhaps form the basis for the self-funded growth. Let me explain to you where that is gonna come from. I promise I won't talk about all the individual projects. There is a reason why I put all of this, because I wanted to really highlight kind of three points here. First is, you know, there is a tremendous breadth and depth of investment opportunities across our producing assets, right? You can see that here. In our base case, these deliver over 120,000 barrels a day of production by 2025. That's tremendous amount of kind of tangible visibility we have. Second point is, and that's why James is excited about this, we have a lot of discretion in our capital spend, and that's both up and down.
Again, you know, historically, as you know, for Tullow, we're balance sheet constrained. With those capital constraints, you're trying to optimize your capital allocation within that. I think we take those constraints away. There's an opportunity across the entire portfolio to be able to high grade spend, to be able to accelerate. That I think is a tremendous driver of value creation for the group. I think post the completion, we'll have a proper capital markets story and be able to outline that in more detail. But to give you kind of a couple of examples, right? Like if you think in Ghana, right, we have outlined our goal, the potential for Jubilee to get to 100,000 barrels a day, potential to get to 50,000 barrels a day.
I think we're in a position to even today to start accelerating kind of that reality. In Q3, you'll see us commit to a second rig that we'll bring on in the first half of 2022. I think similarly in Egypt, you know, we're talking about bringing, as Simon's talking about bringing two additional rigs, which is expected to start during this year. That's in addition to the current three that are there. I think, as I said before, there is in addition to all this, we have significant option value in Kenya with the discovered resource. In terms of the exploration, there's a tremendous amount of commonality and approach between both the companies. Tremendous focus on the exploration of other producing assets. Whether it's in Egypt, whether it's in Gabon, whether it's Ghana, Côte d'Ivoire.
This is really almost what I call short cycle exploration. Which is accessible to infrastructure, you discover, you put it on stream quickly. I think we both have, whether it's in Mauritania or Guyana, some high impact opportunity with limited capital exposure. When you look at this, you can see there's a compelling proposition where we have the ability to drive growth, visibly to deliver value, and importantly, not just for our shareholders. Those of you on the call, but also for our host nation. Let me elaborate a little bit on that part, because really host nations and communities for us are very critical stakeholders. I think both of us independently, both Tullow and Capricorn, we have delivered and we continue to deliver, some material value for host nations through our discoveries.
That's kind of why we put this kind of chart about discoveries here. It was a little bit of kind of looking back in time. I mean, in India, you know, when Simon and I worked together, we discovered over two billion barrels of oil equivalent and invested about $6 billion in Rajasthan, right?
Yeah.
That's huge. That generated $20 billion of value for India, right? That's material, right? I think if you look in Ghana, we've talked about the Ghana value maximization plan, $4.5 billion of capital spend, which will create over $12 billion in value for the nation. Again, very material. The Kenya project, right. We're targeting a resource base of 600 million barrels of oil equivalent plateau production of 120,000 barrels a day. That will deliver material value. Really at the heart of this new company, we said we're a leading company in Africa. The ability to create and be integral to the economic and social development of our host nations is quite key.
I think that resilient business will deliver additional benefits around local content within our supply chains, where we ensure that we're building capability around social investment programs. We're working with local and national governments in terms of helping and supporting on their priorities. You know, for example, like in Ghana, we've been very active in the senior high schools program, and that's something that we feel very privileged to be part of, where we can support through material resources we're providing, which gives broader access to education to students. I think another part which is quite critical is the focus on natural gas, right? That is a kind of two or three part story. One is, you know, we take access to energy and power for granted, right?
Which is not the case in a lot of Africa. In Ghana, for example, you know, 25% population doesn't have access to power. In Côte d'Ivoire, it's 36%. You go to rural areas, it's substantially more, right? The gas, whether we look at the gas in Egypt or we look at our gas resources in Ghana, becomes a critical driver for giving energy access to people. It's a critical driver as you displace expensive diesel. It's a critical driver as you displace charcoal. It's also, you know, energy security today is a critical thing, as you've seen gas flows move away from Africa to Europe, right? That's creating a gap or a challenge of energy security in Africa. We feel like we are tremendous partners for host governments in ensuring energy security.
Also, gas as a driver for industrial development. I think it's something which you'll hear us talk more about, but this is a key theme for the new company, which is really being a true partner for our host nations and communities. The other dimension of that is environmental stewardship. Maybe I want to talk about environment in two parts. There's a big focus I know around emissions, but it's more than that. Emissions, let's start with that, because I think we're fully committed to reducing emissions and to being, as Simon said, a responsible developer for oil and gas. We're targeting a net zero on Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions by 2030, and there's a clear plan around it. This is not just an ambition.
The plan is in two parts. There are very tangible emissions reductions program that are underway in Egypt, in Gabon, in Ghana. This is all well-defined projects and that's all kind of budgeted and part of our respective business plans. In addition to that, what we're looking at is there are residual emissions which we'll offset by a lot of nature-based carbon offsets. The key here is that we want to drive these ourselves, because in essence, a lot of the nature-based programs are really social programs, and they are in our host nations, in our host communities. We feel that's very important for therefore these projects to be run by us and but independently verified.
That means that it's not just about emissions, but it's also much more comprehensive about the social impact. We know it's not a complete solution to managing the emissions, but we think it can go a long way in terms of mitigating the impact. You know, like I said, it's not just about emissions. Again, over time, we'll talk much more about broadening the narrative to showcase to you what we're doing in other areas where, for example, in biodiversity, where we're using our presence in the field, you know, whether it's onshore or offshore, really to focus, for example, on monitoring, protecting vulnerable species. That's something I think again, that's near and dear to the culture, the heart, and the ethos of both the companies.
I'm gonna move away from this to a bit more kind of to go first to James, so he can talk about, you know, how the value manifests, and then I'll come back and conclude. James, over to you, please.
Thanks, Rahul. On the next few slides, I'll run through the cash flow generation capacity of the combined business, which really underpins the value creation opportunity set. Then we'll look at what that means for the balance sheet as we roll forward, and I'll also set out how we're thinking about the capital allocation framework. As Rahul and Simon have both mentioned, the combined business has significant potential for accelerated organic growth, as well as the capacity for inorganic expansion over time. What we set out on this slide is just the cash flow generation from that base business plan, which will take us from 100,000 barrels of oil equivalent a day currently through to about 120 by 2025.
As you can see, the portfolio is extremely robust at low oil prices, and that's as a result of the low average production cost and G&A. Forecast to generate $3.5 billion of operating cash flow and $1.1 billion of free cash flow before debt service, even at $55 Brent flat from today. Obviously, at higher oil prices because today's revenues will be significantly higher and that benefits all of our stakeholders, our host governments, as well as our shareholders. You can see at a $100 Brent, we'd expect operating cash flow of $5.7 billion and pre-financing free cash flow of $3.6 billion over the same period. It's worth just reiterating points made.
These cash flows take account of this page of the benefits of expected annual synergies of $50 million a year, which is obviously a clearly a material source of value for the combined business, which we don't have on a standalone basis. Looking now at the combined balance sheet, you can see the combined group had a net debt to EBITDA multiple pro forma for year-end 2021 of 1.5x, and combined liquidity of $1.8 billion. That's from balance sheet cash and undrawn bank facilities.
I think the important thing to point out is that by year-end 2022, so the expected sort of start date for the combined entity, we expect that leverage multiple to be below 1x, and then deleveraging further thereafter as a result of the cash flows that you've seen on the previous slide. Clearly that's a very strong starting position for the combined group. It gives us the flexibility to optimize the capital structure by reducing the quantum of debt and potentially the cost of the group's debt, and thereby maximizing the cash flow available for enhancing equity value. I think on...
Just to summarize on the balance sheet, it's important to stress that we're committed to maintaining a prudent level of balance sheet debt and one that we're confident will keep leverage multiples modest even at, even when tested at lower oil prices. However, the strength of the cash flow generation profile from the asset base is such that we believe we can do that and maintain that prudence at the same time as generating significant capacity to accelerate high return organic opportunities to consider inorganic expansion and to deliver consistent and meaningful returns to shareholders. On that note, we set out on this slide, a framework or if you like, priorities for capital allocation.
First and foremost, we'll invest to grow and indeed to decarbonize the core production base across Ghana, Egypt, Gabon, and Cote d'Ivoire, which is where our best defined and most deliverable investment opportunities lie. After that, as we've mentioned, we'll continue to ensure that we maintain a balance sheet that is prudent through price cycles. Initially, we'll focus on optimizing the capital structure, the debt stack post-completion, and at all times, we'll design a capital program to ensure that we maintain that ongoing resilience of the balance sheet. Taking that into account and looking at the combined cash flow strength of the business, we're committing to a base annual dividend of $60 million, which again is set at a level we're confident can be delivered through the cycle.
As you've heard from all of us, and seen in the previous slides, we expect to have significant free cash flow after that base business plan. It's those cash flows that can support investment in the diversified portfolio of high return organic opportunities that will deliver accelerated growth from that portfolio. At the bottom there, you see, you know, our plans for cash flows generated at higher oil prices, and those allow us to consider additional shareholder returns, but also to support a capacity to act as a regional consolidator if and when we see compelling opportunities to do that. On that note, I'll hand back to Rahul.
Okay. Thank you, James. As I said, it's been a collaborative effort, and that sort of really underpins this merger of equals. It's been recommended by both the boards. We're structuring this as an all-share combination, where Tullow will issue new shares to Capricorn shareholders at an exchange ratio, and I'm not gonna read all the decimal points, but about 3.8 new shares for each Capricorn share. It's important that the exchange ratio really reflects the share price performance of both the companies over the recent period. When you do the math, post the combination, the Tullow shareholders would own about 52% of the combined entity and Capricorn shareholders would own 47% of the combined group. I think we're very privileged across both the companies.
We have very experienced people as non-execs. Phuthuma Nhleko, who joined our board recently, will continue as the chair of the combined group. Nicoletta Giadrossi was the chair of Capricorn, she'll come on board as a senior independent director. I'll continue as CEO, and James will join. He and I working together again after 18 years?
Yeah.
Something like that.
I think that's enough.
Yeah. He doesn't wanna say that because it makes him seem a lot older. Simon will share the integration CEO. Very important because he'll share the integration CEO. That really, I think the combined group gets the benefit of clear leadership experience as we combine the best talent and skills from both teams. I think we're targeting getting the deal to complete by the end of the year, post receipt of any relevant regulatory consents and the shareholder approvals. You know, it's interesting. This is, I'm gonna ask kind of a question. It's a rhetorical question.
If you had a blank sheet of paper and you wanted to create a company that was relevant in today's world, that was impactful and also had the ability to create value for shareholders and host nations, and a company that, you know, your shareholders but also employees were really excited to be part of, what would that company look like, right? I'm not gonna give you the answer. I think you'd want a company that had scale, that had visibility and growth, but had focus. But also it had the ability to deliver tangible returns while ensuring responsible development, right? That's a lot to ask for. I think today we're creating that company. You know, 'cause that company doesn't exist.
I think today we're creating that company by combining Capricorn and Tullow. I think that to me is the excitement that we bring. Sorry, just giving a session. That as a kind of leading African energy company with 100,000 barrels a day of production, 1 billion barrels of resource across Africa, that's got materiality and diversity. With a deep portfolio of short cycle, high return opportunities, we can deliver visible growth. We can deliver cash flows. That's all through a self-funded investment program. The balance sheet cash flows that James talked about, that helps us further accelerate this investment, but at the same time, deliver tangible returns to shareholders in a predictable manner. I believe, I think that's the conviction that we have as a team.
That's the conviction the board has, that this will become a must-own investment. I think this will be a company that people will want to own, not just have to own. Equally, it will be a trusted and a credible partner, even more so than we are today, for our host nations and other stakeholders. Look, I think with that, we'll conclude, but really look forward to your support as we take this merger forward, and look to create this very exciting company. Thank you again for your time, but, we're open to your questions now. Are we starting in the room?
Hi guys, Alex Smith from Investec. Congratulations on the merger. I guess the first question is just on the medium-term ambition of the new group. You mentioned the upside at $100 per barrel oil, $3.5 billion free cash flow. You now have the scale and the opportunity, but what are you going to do with the cash? Are you going to be a free cash flow dividend vehicle? We have other E&Ps in the sector paying 10% dividend yields. Or is the opportunity to go out there and acquire more assets across the African region? There are plenty of disposals coming. We see all the majors are ready to dispose of assets at quite good multiples. You now have the scale and no need to deleverage, so is there opportunity there?
Second of all, can you refinance earlier under the corporate action announcement, or when is the next time for you to bring down your cost of debt? Thank you.
Do that in two parts. Maybe let me answer kind of the growth part, and then James can cover the capital return and the refi piece. I think, Alex, what's exciting to me is again, you know, if you have a well-defined opportunity set, and I think certainly kind of at Jubilee and I think to some extent also at Kenya, I think there is a constraint, a capital-constrained investment portfolio right now. I think we can do better together from an investment viewpoint. I would say base case, we're going from 100 to 120 thousand barrels a day. We've got the TEN Enhancement project. We can bring additional rigs into Egypt. We're looking at gas development.
We're looking to bring in a second rig early, you know, in first half of next year. I think there's a lot we can do to deliver visible growth organically in the near term, right? That is a pretty cool place to be. I think that excites us. I think Kenya is a big thing because, again, and we'll update you guys in due course, but that provides us visibility kind of production growth in the beyond 2025 timeframe. You have all the options you talked about. I think before we think inorganic, I think we have a tremendous opportunity set within the portfolio that we can unlock, right?
I think I don't wanna steal James' thunder, but I think his focus is very much on this kind of very disciplined capital allocation and balancing that return. Let me not.
Well, look, I think on shareholder distributions, I mean, the important thing to say is that we've set the base dividend level at $60 million because we think that is meaningful but also sustainable through the cycle. You know, that's our thinking around setting it at that level. You know, as Rahul has said, it's a good place to be in to be able to make these capital allocation decisions between having reinvestment opportunities within the existing portfolio, which are compelling, the flexibility to expand through inorganic growth if we see compelling opportunities to do that, and clearly, you know, as ever, to weigh those both up against returning more to shareholders. It'll be a disciplined capital allocation process across those three, right?
I mean, we will only expand inorganically if it's more compelling to do that than to return value to shareholders or to reinvest in existing programs. I mean, it's kind of obvious things to say, but I think, you know, what we've designed here is a business that enables us to make those decisions. On the debt stack, I mean, I think you probably wouldn't expect me to say too much about plans for refinancing, that was your word, at this stage.
You know, as we said, what the position we'll be in is one of strength, less than 1x leverage, obviously very significant liquidity available at the point of, you know, when we envisage the inception of this combined business, puts us in a strong position to optimize that. Clearly the net debt position will be low. There's an opportunity to reduce the overall debt quantum quite significantly. Obviously we'll be looking at the cost and structure of our debt too.
Colin Grant from Davy. Very much congrats on the announcement this morning. Just in terms of the guidance you've given here in terms of the combined cumulative outlook, the $2.4 billion of CapEx between 2022 and 2035. You mentioned there, Rahul, that you can see production going from, you know, 100- 120 thousand barrels a day, and just wanna run through if that's captured within these numbers, and what specific areas and how are you working out how to prioritize whether it's in Ghana or Egypt or how do you, how do you work that out?
Colin, right now what you have is a kind of very simplistic, just a kind of an aggregation of both. What is missing, which is what I think we would love to come back to in a proper kind of capital market space to say how, what does the optimized program look like? I think to be honest with you, I think all we've done is just added the two together. There's not a lot more I mean, not a lot more optimization. But I think the key is what James said, which is that you've got a balance sheet, right? It's unconstrained. There's a lot more you can do when you have this massive opportunity set and, but that requires thought, I think. I think just be patient, but we'll come back to you.
It is gonna look more interesting.
I mean, just to be on the specific point, the $2.4 billion you saw on that slide earlier on, I mean, that's the capital program. I mean, as you all said, it's just added together at this time, that delivers that 100-120 thousand barrels of oil a day over the next four years. It's that base investment program, not an acceleration of anything else beyond that.
Fred Binka from Farallon. Congrats Rahul and colleagues. I guess one question I had on the regulatory side, is that just from a U.K. basis or, you know, sort of, places like, you know, the regulators in Ghana and Egypt, you know, will that factor in terms of the hurdles you need to pass?
Well, firstly good to see you. I think it's, you know this, I mean, we work closely with host governments everywhere we go. I think both companies have a tremendous track record of good relationships. I think we certainly would. The way we see it is the real question is, kind of, we need support from host governments as we look to accelerate programs. You know, I think so the wider question I think really is making sure that we bring people along on this, and that's what we are engaging with people and making sure we have their support. The specifics, I think we will share, kind of, in due course in terms of what the specifics require.
Okay. We can now take questions from the conference call.
If you'd like to ask a question on the call, please press star one on your telephone keypad. To withdraw your question, please press star two. The first question comes from the line of Nathan Piper from Investec. Please go ahead.
Morning. Congratulations on the merger. I wonder if you could answer this question. I think Alex has already asked quite a few good ones already. On the competition for capital in the new portfolio, how can fixed gas price, high tax gas in Egypt compete for capital with high return oil price leveraged investment opportunities from Ghana? I mean, how do you see the quality and the ability of those portfolios to beat capital internally? I guess secondly, is there any further progress on securing a deal in Kenya, or does this new group have a different outlook on how they might tackle developing the Kenyan opportunity? Thank you.
Hi, Nathan. This is James. I mean, just on, just in terms of the competition for capital across the portfolio, I mean, we're obviously at the early stages of setting out what those capital priorities will be. If you plot a chart, as we've started to do, of the IRRs by project across the portfolio, you know, you can see it, you know, at the top end of those, a smattering of Egypt, Gabon, and Ghana and others all together. You know, clearly there are different types of investments in Egypt. That's partly about small incremental things that can be done to expand gas production capacity, debottlenecking, well workovers, incremental drilling.
As you know, in Egypt, we've also had a focus, more recently on drilling, wells that are targeting, increased liquids production. We've been increasing the liquids percentage of that production. I would say, actually, when we started to plot that chart, the countries all overlap each other quite a lot in terms of the returns from investment opportunities.
Just to echo that, Nathan, I think it's, as you know, kind of, we're driven very much by a very rigorous capital allocation framework. I think James kind of thinks the same as I do on that topic. We're gonna continue to drive that. I think it's about short cycle, high return opportunities, and I think also diversifying it so that you do mitigate, you know, some risk. You asked about Kenya. I think I'm gonna say what I said at the AGM, so it sounds a little bit repetitive, but it still happens to be true, which is we're making good progress, I think, in terms of our farm down efforts, in terms of bringing a strategic partner in. Doesn't change.
Your question is, I don't think it's, it does not change that strategy. I think we like the project a lot. I think we believe it's important to bring in a strategic partner to help mitigate some of our capital exposure. Kenya very much, I think, becomes even more central to this idea of creating a leading you know, African energy company. You know, you think about a business that's strong in West Africa, North Africa, East Africa. I think if anything, you know, Kenya to me becomes even more central and that effort sort of continues. Again, I'll say something which is very English, in due course, I guess you will hear from us.
Thanks.
Thanks, Nathan.
Thanks for the color. I guess you have got the Kenyan elections in early August. I mean, is that sort of a point in time to focus on where there might be, you know? Is that in due course, the ninth is something happening before early August?
I love it. Look, I think it's as much as you know this very well. Like, when you're dealing with non-Anglo-Saxon timeframes, I think it's hard to be definitive. I don't know if that said anything at all. No, look, I you know, I think we're working, I think, pretty closely with the Kenyan government, with the potential partners, with just, you know, our own partners as well. It'll happen when it does. I will say, look, we'll tell you when we're ready.
I'll wait patiently. Thank you very much.
The next question comes from the line of Chris Wheaton from Stifel. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much. Good morning, everyone. One question from me, please. I'm still struggling to understand, having listened to the presentation, what the combined business can do that either company could not do on its own. I understand Nathan's question about high-grading the portfolio, but I would have thought the biggest impact would be not in the top returning projects, which both companies would have done anyway, but it would be further down in the capital allocation stack, if you like. I'm struggling to see where the merger of these two companies can actually deliver anything meaningful on a meaningful timescale. It's interesting to note your slide with the combined activities of the business.
Again, if you add those two together, if you look at 120,000 BOE a day, 2025, that again seems very much in line with where the two combined businesses would sit anyway individually. Could you help me please understand what I'm missing here this morning? Thank you.
I think that's a good question, Chris. First, what we've said before is that what we're showing you today, right, is simply just adding up the two business plans together. That's a $2.4 billion capital, which takes you from 100 to 120 thousand dollars a day, right. That's kind of the business as is. Now, I think the question, which is we have and as do Capricorn, you know, we have sculpted our capital program over the next few years in a capital constrained world because we have to delever. You end up with spending less capital candidly than we would have liked to do, right.
You'd say, okay, so the things that we can do differently. If you take Jubilee. Jubilee, you've got infill program, you've got Southeast and Northeast. The infrastructure is gonna be done by next year. You unleash a further kind of infill program on the East. We're doing a lot of work on the TEN Enhancement project. We're looking to drill two strategic wells this year. Now, I think the pace of the TEN Enhancement project would look very different in an unconstrained world than it does today, right? That's what I said earlier, is that we are not in a position to describe that today, but we would certainly do that, you know, when we have a capital markets day.
I think in Egypt, we have a big resource and you add more rigs, you will be able to do more, right? You can then look to invest in the facilities infrastructure, debottlenecking gas processing and things like that. I think across the portfolio, you've got opportunities which in a less balance sheet constrained world you would seek to optimize. The return portfolio that James talked about, right? It's quite a substantial portfolio. Even the tail, which we wouldn't prioritize today because we just don't have the capital, is very compelling from a return perspective. I think that's the big point. I think you say, okay, well, what would the combined company do that we can't do independently? One is we would have a different capital program, right?
Which would be high-graded, it'd be different, which would have acceleration potential, number one. Number two is that we are delivering then a consistent capital return to our shareholders, both in terms of a base dividend that James talked about, plus additional returns. We have diversity which individually we don't have. We've got a single company focus, I think. For example, I mean, we're capped by individual country ratings, right? The combined group, you've got $100,000 a day, you've got $1 billion of resource. That then from a ratings perspective is very different. Why does that matter? That translates into a lower cost of capital, right? The business is self-funding, right? You have the scale in a world like today, you have a business that's self-funded, that's got tremendous value, right? You got synergies which we can't do.
$50 million in the scale of the business that we're in, very material, right? You can't do that independently. I think there is big one, but I think there are very compelling reasons what the two companies can bring. That's why I said, like, if you had a blank sheet of paper and you put the company together, this is what you would do.
Okay. That's great answer. Thank you very much indeed.
The next question comes from the line of Rachel Fletcher from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.
Thanks for taking my questions. I have two small questions, please. Firstly, on the oil and gas mix. Combined, you now have, I think you said 75% oil. Is that the sort of mix you hope to maintain going forward? On exploration, how are you thinking about exploration in general? What happens to existing exploration assets outside of Africa, for example, Mexico and Suriname? Thanks.
I'll answer that first bit. So the last of that question.
The exploration continues as is. We have some commitments, obligations with fulfilling. We have a well coming up in Mexico. We'll see how that goes. We sort of have the well in Guyana coming up shortly. We have some ILX opportunities in the UK. You know, those are commitments. And we'll see how they progress. But other than that, I mean, I think, you know, as we've each said separately, it becomes much more relevant together. There's a very interesting ILX program across the asset base. I mean, obviously in Egypt from our perspective, continue to pursue and accelerate that. You know, Rahul has talked about both in Ghana and Gabon, principally.
Exploration will continue, but it'd be very focused in the same way that it has been in terms of spend. Certainly, you know, anything outside of these core assets, you know, be a very capital disciplined approach towards future exploration wells, for example, something like Mauritania, which are big, exciting prospect. You know, we will farm that down before drilling it.
In terms of the mix, Rachel, I'd turn you to kind of page six. It's interesting because you look at the current production or 2021 production, it's about 76% liquids. The 2P reserves is 75% liquids. The 2C resource is 79% liquids. I think that ratio in the kind of mid-seventies seems kind of at least across the board. I think specifically it goes back to kind of the point James was talking about, just from a capital allocation point of view and how that return profile actually guides our capital allocation framework, which we'll know better, I think once we've done a deeper dive across the two portfolios.
I think those numbers give you some context, I think, around where the longer term kind of oil and gas mix is gonna be. I mean, I don't think we can go much far from where our resource base is. Does that help?
Yes. Thank you very much.
The next question comes from the line of Mark Wilson from Jefferies. Please go ahead.
Hi. Good morning. Yes, my question I'd like to ask you, very clear, at least stated distinct identifier, identity reflecting the focus on Africa, which is obviously very clear from the production base, and with the ILX exploration as well as Mauritania you've just spoken to. I'd like to ask just how much that strategic identity moves, regarding the U.K. position that particularly Kenya still has in terms of, well, exploration, certainly. You mentioned some ILX wells this year, but is there a strategic desire to move all activities away from the U.K. North Sea?
May I ask as well, with regard to a week where we spent nothing but talking about tax situations in the U.K., whether Cairn's, Capricorn's earn out from the sale of North Sea assets is affected by the current U.K. tax changes. Do you see a strategic exit from everything within the U.K. North Sea? Is there any tax implications for that earn out? Thank you.
Let me answer the first part, and James can answer on the tax. No is the short answer. I mean, as we're saying, we're focused on Africa. That's where our projection base is. As I said earlier, we have interesting positions and commitments in a number of other countries. We're looking forward to seeing how those progress. You know, we have flexibility when we come back to the balance sheet in the event of success to either pursue or to bring in other partners. I think, you know, we will see how the results come, and then we'll make a judgment call. Again, it's against that backdrop of financial flexibility.
The core producing base and the bulk of the investment activity, yes, will be focused on Africa.
Yeah. Hi, Mark. On the specific question about the contingent payments from the UK sale, the sale of Catcher and Kraken. No, those are, that's calculated on a pre-tax basis. As we set out at the time of the announcement, it's basically, you know, the revenues. It's a percentage of the revenues generated from the oil price above 55. It's straight off the top line.
All right. Excellent. Very clear. Both. One last question on the exploration, because I would've said, actually I thought Capricorn was almost unique in the E&P world at maintaining an international exploration portfolio as others moved away from it. Can I check on one specific area, and that is the Israel offshore exploration. Is that still part of the portfolio and what are the plans there?
Yeah, it is still part of the portfolio. We will get to a decision on next steps in Israel towards the end of the year, I think in Q3.
All right. Excellent. Thank you very much. Yes, I'll add my congratulations to the merger. I think it's one for the times. Thank you.
Great. Thank you.
The last question comes from the line of James Thompson from JP Morgan. Please go ahead.
Great. Thank you very much. Good morning, and congratulations, chaps, on the merger. Just a quick question on the, and I appreciate, Rahul, you sort of talked through this. It's fairly early days in your thinking in terms of the combined entity. You know, slide ten there, the 2022-2025 outlook. I mean, you talk about. Just wanted to sort of look at the numbers on the combined entity there because, you know, you talk about 170 million barrels from over the four-year 2022 to 2025. You know, that's 40 odd million barrels a year or 115, 116 thousand a day on average. You know, you're gonna do 96 this year as a combined group.
I mean, this implies, you know, going over 120 pretty soon. I think is that an ambition that you're gonna be above 120 for most of 2023, 2024, 2025?
I think, James, I prefer again, not to kinda get down into the shape of the transition, but I think in your math, I think this year we'll do, if you took the guidance of both the companies, I think we'll do 100. I'd start 2020. 96 was last year. You would be at 100. I think if you do kinda your averages, that might give you a better sense of how the thing gets sculpted. But again, I'd feel a lot more comfortable once we had line of sight on the balance of the capital allocation, and that allows us to be much more precise on 2023, 2024 production. Yeah.
Okay. That's just in terms of the capital piece there, I mean, you're buying like sort of $600 million a year. Should we think about that as a base? I mean, judging by everything you said in terms of essentially adding rigs in Ghana, obviously in Egypt as well, and the commentary around kinda Kenya and where that might take you in terms of actually investing in that asset for growth. I mean, we should be considered as the $2.4 billion a base and I mean, I know you appreciate you showing it in terms of just giving us some sensitivities around the oil price. But should there be a bit more flex in terms of the $50-$100 type range?
Again, I don't want to kinda misguide right now, James. We kinda told you what we know, and I don't wanna pretend that we have a better resolution of how the capital allocations would change. Just be patient. I mean, you'll have to form your own judgment, unfortunately, right now. I think we do wanna spend some time thinking through this carefully and see what the interplay. Again, I go back to James' slide on the discipline kinda capital allocation. You just need to weigh how much do we return, what do we invest, what's the inorganic opportunity? The point I think I wanna leave you with is that the business has a very strong balance sheet and cash flow generation. We've never had this, kinda this ability to have this debate between returning capital and accelerating CapEx.
It's kind of in a new world a little bit right now. We wanna think through that in a very disciplined manner. I think we're not short of opportunities. We recognize also, and I'll say this carefully, that we recognize the importance of returning capital to shareholders. Right? We just wanna get that balance right. How do we make money for you guys in the most effective way? How do we get that balance right? I think that's what excites us. I think that you're creating something that's unique. It's we couldn't do this on our own. You know, we can self-funded programs, so you can manage that. You can return capital to shareholders. James and Simon talk about the kinda inorganic potential. I think the industry is consolidating.
I think this company becomes, you know, well-placed for that. We'll do it if it makes money. Right? That's the key. I think it puts us in a very unique position. I would probably stop there.
Okay. About how this will, you know, how it'll ultimately knit together. I'll leave it at that. I look forward to catching the market today. Yeah, just congratulations once again on the merger.
Thank you. Thank you.
There are no further questions, so I'll hand back to your host to conclude today's conference. Thank you.
Okay. Well, thanks everybody for joining and those who are here. Well, thanks again for making the effort to join us in person. We look forward to engaging. I think both our teams are gonna stand by, so if people have questions, don't hesitate to reach out. We would very much kinda look forward to your support as we take the business forward. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you for joining today's call. You may now disconnect.