Africa Oil's Chief Legal Officer and Corporate Secretary. It's my pleasure to welcome you to Africa Oil's Annual General Meeting today. The purpose of this meeting is as follows: First, to receive a consolidated audit, audited financial statements and accompanying management's discussion and analysis for the company for the year ended December 31, 2023, together with a report of the auditors. Second, to appoint PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP as auditors of the company to hold office until the next AGM, at a remuneration to be fixed by the directors of the company. Third, to consider, and if deemed advisable, approve an advisory resolution to accept the company's approach to executive compensation. And fourth and finally, to elect the directors to hold office for the following year. After completing the formal part of today's meeting, we will host a question and answer session for the company's shareholders.
I'll now hand you over to Africa Oil CFO, Pascal Nicodeme.
Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Pascal Nicodeme. I'm the Chief Financial Officer of Africa Oil Corp. Welcome to the company's Annual General Meeting of shareholders. I'd like to introduce John Craig, Africa Oil's chairman, Roger Tucker, our CEO of Africa Oil, Joan Kay, who has just presented herself, Oliver Quinn, Chief Commercial Officer, and Shahin Amini, our IR Manager. The meeting will now come to order. I will act as chair of the meeting, and Ms. Susan Ferguson will act as recording secretary of the meeting. The company's register and transfer agent is Computershare Investor Services Inc. Ms. Pamela Horsfield is here on behalf of Computershare and will act as scrutineer of the meeting.
The notice of the meeting and the other meeting materials were mailed to the shareholders of the company on the twenty-fourth of April, two thousand and twenty-four, as evidenced by the affidavit of mailing received from Computershare. As such, I declare proper notice of the meeting has been given, and the meeting has been duly constituted for the conduct of the business of the meeting. The company's article provide that a quorum is two shareholders entitled to vote at the meeting, whether in person or by proxy, who hold, in aggregate, at least 5% of the issued shares entitled to be voted at the meeting. I have the scrutineer's preliminary written report on attendance, which indicates a quorum is present. Before commencing with the formal business of the meeting, I would like to comment on the voting procedure.
The proxy cutoff was 10:00 A.M. Pacific Time on the 21st of May, 2024. Only registered shareholders may be permitted to vote in person during the meeting. Shareholders wishing to raise questions and/or comments pertaining to the business before the meeting will have an opportunity to do so following the formal business of the meeting, when recognized by the chair. As the first item of business, I would like to present to the meeting the audited, consolidated financial statement of the company for the year ended 31st of December, 2023, together with a report of the auditors on the statements. Copies of these documents were mailed to the shareholders who requested them, and they are available on the company's website. It is not proposed to read them at this meeting.
The next item of business is the reappointment of the company's auditors and the granting of authority to the Board of Directors of the company to fix the remuneration to be paid to the auditors. PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, PwC, has been the company's auditor since the eighth of October, 2008. Shareholders voted by proxy on the VIF, and have voted in favor of the reappointment of PwC as the company's auditors to hold office until the close of the next Annual Meeting of Shareholders , or until their successors are appointed at the remuneration to be fixed by the directors. As more particularly described in the Management Information Circular for this meeting, shareholders were being asked to consider and vote on an advisory resolution on executive compensation, otherwise known as Say on Pay, to enhance the company's dialogue with shareholders with respect to its compensation programs.
On an advisory basis only, and not to diminish the role and responsibility of the company's Board of Directors, shareholders voted by proxy on the Say on Pay, and have voted in favor of the company's approach to executive compensation, disclosed in the Management Information Circular. The next item of business is the election of the directors of the company. The company did not receive notice of any director nominations in connection with the meeting, within the time prescribed in the company's articles. As such, the only person eligible to be nominated for election to the board were the persons nominated by management. Shareholders were being asked to elect the directors of the company to serve until the next Annual Meeting of Shareholders , or until such successors are elected or appointed.
Management nominated the following eight persons as director of the company: Andrew Bartlett, John Craig, Michael Ebsary, Gary Guidry, Keith Hill, Erin Johnston, Roger Tucker, and Kimberly Wood. Shareholders voted by proxy on the VIF, and have voted in favor of electing the nominees as directors of the company to serve until the next Annual Meeting of Shareholders, or until their successors are elected or appointed. I will now ask if there is any further business to be properly brought before this meeting? If there is no further business, I declare the meeting terminated.
Thank you, Pascal. Now that the formal part of the AGM business is over, I am delighted to welcome our shareholders who've joined on the webcast and on the conference call facility and those attending in person. My name is Shahin Amini. I'm the Investor Relations Manager for the company, and I will coordinate a Q&A session. Our Chairman, John Craig, and our President and CEO, Roger Tucker, will start with introductory statements before we open up the Q&A session. You can submit your questions or comments through the webcast facility at any time, or for those attending in person in Vancouver, please let Susan know if you wish to ask a question.
Those shareholders joining us through the conference call facility and who have already registered their intention to speak can join the queue by pressing star and then one, one on your telephone keypad. Before we get started, it is important to remind everyone that remarks made during this session are subject to forward-looking statements, which involve significant risk factors and assumptions, and have been fully described in the company's continuous disclosure reports. The information discussed is made as of today's date and time, and the company assumes no obligation to update or to revise the information to reflect new events or circumstances, except as required by law. The company's complete financial statements are available on the company's website and on SEDAR. On that note, I am pleased to hand over to our chairman, Mr. John Craig. We're ready for you. Please go ahead.
But, okay. Apologize. I'll put my hand up again. I'm the chairman of the company, and on behalf of the board, I thank you for your continued support of the company, and I'm pleased to have this, this opportunity today to engage with you in our post-AGM Q&A session. I have been the chair of the board since 2016, and I'm proud of our progress over the last eight years. The company has transformed from a single development project enterprise to a full cycle E&P company with material reserves, production, and free cash flows. There were many ups and downs during this period, as you are all aware, but we have navigated the challenges and opportunities to have a company today that has a strong debt-free balance sheet, high netback production, and attractive growth opportunities that are funded.
I am proud that we have delivered on our shareholder capital returns aspiration with the institution of a base dividend policy and executing share buybacks. Your board is focused on disciplined capital allocation as we work with the management team to grow the company sustainably over the long term. We must strike the right capital allocation balance between preserving balance sheet strength, shareholder capital returns, and growth. On that note, I will hand you over to Roger.
I haven't been with Africa Oil as long as John, but I was very pleased 10 months ago to receive the board's endorsement, to take over the reins from my predecessor, Keith Hill, to lead the company on its next stage of growth and value creation. The first thing that attracted me to the company, and as you've all seen, is the Africa Oil has underlying assets of great quality. I've worked with the board to deliver, over this past 10 months, a disciplined strategic business plan that is focused on our four key assets, which are Nigeria, Namibia, South Africa, the west coast of South Africa, and Equatorial Guinea.
And as part of this process, we've implemented some important organizational changes, including key strategic recruitments, and these have already yielded positive results, as demonstrated by our recent farm down agreements for assets offshore Namibia and South Africa. These agreements, then announced earlier this year, are key in securing the company's long-term growth prospects and de-risking our balance sheet going forward. These agreements were also critical in enabling us to increase our shareholder capital returns, which we did immediately after announcing the farm out of Namibia. And we have a good balance with the existing portfolio between funded growth opportunities, a robust balance sheet, and we continue disciplined work to optimize those core assets while following key capital allocation priorities. So okay, let's hear from our shareholders, and Shahin, I'll leave you to administer that.
If you're joining us through the webcast, you can submit your question and comments using the platform. And if you've already registered your intention and want to speak, on the conference call facility, please join the queue by pressing star and then one one on your keypad. But first, let's go to Vancouver and see if there are any questions from those attending in person. So Susan? Can you please check with our, I believe it's a online shareholder, whether they have any comments or questions? So I will now go to the operator. Heidi, can you please see if we have any attendees joining through the conference call facility? And well, we do have only—we've only had one registered, and that is Michael from Sweden. So if you could open up his line, please.
Your line is open. Please ask your question.
Great. Thank you very much for the webcast today of this AGM and opportunity to ask some questions. As a side note, I am the author of a recent letter to the board, signed by close to 200 collective shareholders. I'm not representing those today, but it might be worth mentioning. So I have four questions for today. First off, Craig, around mid-2010, Africa Oil brought in close to $1 billion in equity financing. As of today, Africa Oil's current market cap is, I mean, close to $800 million. In hindsight, how do you feel Africa Oil has capitalized on those funds?
What I would say in that regard, Michael, and thank you for your question, we have developed the company to one with reserves, production and free cash flows. We have returned about $130 million through dividends and share buybacks, and we have a high net back production business through our shareholding in Prime. Prime acquisition was a transformational investment for Africa Oil. Recall that we paid, I think, $520 million in closing on cash payment, and we received full payback in under three years. We have 2P reserves of more than 50 million barrels to underpin our long-term production outlay. Africa Oil also has the leading position in the highly sought after Orange Basin amongst our independent E&P peer groups, and we have retained exposure to the development of the Venus discovery at no upfront cost.
We have also retained upside exposure to follow on prospectivity in the Orange Basin, where we are carried to production. Overall, I think the company is in a financially strong position, and we have balanced shareholder returns with funded growth opportunities. I think I, I would point out that a lot of the capital was raised on the back of our early discoveries in Kenya. Obviously, that project has not turned out the way we wished, and as you know, we've announced that we are exiting that project. But I think it is important to recall that we did monetize some of our interest in Kenya through a farm down agreement with Maersk in 2015. This deal allowed Africa Oil to acquire its Nigerian business, and I think that's an important thing to keep in mind.
We would not have been able to acquire our interest in Prime if we had not achieved that farm down, which was on the back of our Kenya interest. So, I think overall, I'm proud of what we've accomplished. I know that there's been disappointment in the stock price, and believe me, the board and management are disappointed as well. But I think we have underpinned a story here, a growth story, a sustainable shareholder return story, and I'm very confident that we've accomplished something that will be rewarded in the market in due course.
And so for my second question here, long-term share price, maybe not developed as expected, equity financing, current market cap. How would you justify continuing such a pace, if you may use that word, without... Well, what I see a clear and outright share price metric connected to the long-term incentive programs. How's the discussions around such a metric being done in on the board?
Just for me, I believe. Thank you. There's an extensive description of our compensation process and the results of that process in the Annual Information Form that was sent out in conjunction with this meeting. Clearly, the key principle in our compensation philosophy is linking the pay to performance, and this is focused on the long-term delivery by the executive management, linking corporate strategy, performance, and compensation. We also have specific criteria for environmental, social, governance, health, and safety performance. It's important to highlight that significant elements of our LTIP for the executive management compensation is at risk.... The share-based compensation can also be volatile from one year to next, as the LTIP units awarded and how they are accounted for, i.e., non-cash costs reported on the income statement, are impacted by the share price movements.
You've asked, you know, how do we link share performance? I think if you look at our compensation process, both the PSUs and the RSUs are vested after three years. They are priced at the beginning of that period of time, and only valued at the end of the three-year period. Obviously, the change in share price has a substantial impact on those values, and you saw that in our 2023 compensation report. So I would challenge your statement that it's not share linked. I think it is substantially linked to shareholder price, and also in our assessment, our performance table in conjunction with the PSUs, total shareholder return is a factor.
So, you know, I would also point out that, you know, I recognize that compensation is always an issue for shareholders, but we have, you know, we get a vote on Say on Pay. And this year, we received 96.5% support for our compensation system, as compared to 92.2% last year. So, I think our compensation system works well, and I think that the shareholder approval of our compensation system reflects that.
A recent comparison for Africa Oil's G&A, compared to some of the peers mentioned by Africa Oil, where numbers is disclosed by these peers, show that comparably, Africa Oil has a fairly high G&A. 5 is the number I have, versus closer to $1.5 per barrel. Is that something you have reflected on or discussed in the board?
... Projects at that point. Can we actually, because often there's a bit of a technical accounting point to that, if I may, I would like to actually ask Pascal to perhaps share your views, because you received a similar question in our town hall meeting a few weeks ago. So could you just share your views on that, and then we could go to and see if John has any follow-on comments?
Yeah, no, no, exactly. I think, I mean, a few comments on that. First, I mean, you need to be careful when you look at G&A and make sure that you exclude any non-cash G&A from the calculation, especially when you refer to equity-linked remuneration. But looking at the G&A on our peer group, I mean, you have to realize that we are mostly non-operators of our assets. And if you compare to other companies, other peers, which are operating their own asset, they have the ability to recharge most of their G&A to their projects and assets, which is not our case at the moment.
I think at the same time, we are keen to find sources of cost savings, as always, so we try to optimize our G&As permanently. But very recently, I think we decided to expand the team to make sure that we would have internal competencies that would replace the third-party contractors we were using so far, which was a source of, well, significant G&As, and with the objective to reduce these G&As. So, we are very hopeful to see the impact of these efforts soon in our financial statements, while keeping a very high level of activity. So I think this gives you a few elements to answer this question.
Thank you, Pascal. I don't know, John, do you have any follow-on on that? Okay. Thank you very much.
Then, I have a final question then, maybe a more holistic one. If you-- with the air on the markets, some might say that the confidence in Africa Oil, in terms of delivering value and delivering on promises, may be a bit shaky, buybacks going back and forth. Confidence might not be at the highest. I'm not sure. That's my view of the current situation. How is the board assessing that situation, and how can the board... What are the board doing to improve on that, and in terms, and in follow-up, shareholder value?
My previous answer to one of your questions, that what I felt was the accomplishment of the board, I did indicate that the board and management are disappointed with our share price. But I think that one of the concerns may have been early on, and certainly with the Kenya project, we under-delivered. I acknowledge that, and I think that might have been a problem. I think that has changed... I think that Roger came in with a new strategy, which was fully endorsed by the board, and he's delivering on that strategy. I am very confident that the board will, or the shareholders will recognize, and the investment public will recognize what we've accomplished and the potential value that we've created that is not currently reflected in the share price.
As I say, I think that your company is extremely well positioned. I think our story is now clear. It may have been an unclear strategy in the past, with a mix of emphasis on exploration and development at the same time. I think the story is very clear. I think your management team is delivering that message very clearly, and I believe with the support of the board, the management will deliver, and you will see this value created in the market.
To share some of my views. Some of you know, I used to cover the company as a sell-side analyst from 2010—oh, God—going back to 2010, 2011. Yeah, obviously, Kenya did have a disappointing outcome, but I do recall the, the farm down to Maersk in 2015. I, I agree, I have to give credit to, to the board at that time. That was, that was, in hindsight, a great strategic decision to do that farm down agreement, which allowed us to do so much now. You know, we've got the Prime acquisition under our belt, which given us the free cash flow to build a leading position in the Orange Basin. Might have been disappointing, but again, all credit to the board at that time for getting the, the right risk-return decision.
Anyhow, just my view on that note.
I think I'm done for questions. I've taken up long enough time here, so hopefully we got more.
We do appreciate your, you know, helping to coordinate amongst the Swedish investors and other European investors. We do appreciate your constructive engagement. Let's move to the webcast and other questions that we have received over email. I think it's first to give John a break and maybe put the limelight on Roger. Roger, an easy one. Well, maybe not an easy one. We have a question. Roger, what keeps you up at night?
Well, the good news is, it's not the quality of the underlying assets, which is often a problem that other CEOs face, because as I said in the introduction, the underlying assets this company owns and are focused on are very, very high quality. But I did say in the town hall that we did in Stockholm, we all, as a management team, were kept very much awake at night, leading up to the transaction with Total, where we farmed out our interest to achieve a full carry right through to first oil.
And the thing that was keeping us up at night is that we knew the quality of the underlying asset, and we were getting ready to commit to investing a further year in following our belief in that asset. The moment that we got that deal through, as you have seen, we immediately started the share buybacks because we'd secured and de-risked the balance sheet because of that transaction. And right now, it's good news that keeps us awake because we've got a great asset set. We are in a situation where we have no debt on the balance sheet, and amazingly, for an E&P company, we have virtually no CapEx going forward.
We are in a very, very interesting situation. The thing that keeps you awake at night is making sure that we do the correct thing with the company going forward.
You've been, well, you've obviously been giving the markets the new strategic focus for the company, and important part of it is the focus on core assets. There is a question: what is the company's priority in terms of looking at optimizing its core assets? Is it to consolidate Prime or Impact, or is it the case that we need to work on both those fronts?
One thing that I did inherit, and John knows this, is a non-optimal way of holding our assets via the holding companies that are out there, like the Impact and the Prime, and Eco and Africa Energy. And it made it very difficult, I think, for analysts to see through to where the true value is. And so the first step that we're pursuing is to try to consolidate our positions in the assets that we're focused on. That's why we did the farm out in Namibia. And that transaction was 100% done by Africa Oil on behalf of Impact.
As you've seen, that we've made an offer to try to acquire more of the minority interests in that asset. And we've made that offer on the basis that the gross asset is worth, for Impact, is worth a value of $805 million as our minimum. Now, if you look at the market cap of the company going forward, and goes to Michael's question, the market cap would suggest that there is a fraction of that $805 million, which is built into our market cap. And so we're busy trying to consolidate to improve the way that investors can see through to where the value lies in this company.
... When you joined, you obviously had to come up with a new, strategic plan, discuss and get it approved by the board. But you obviously were busy in, reorganizing the company, and there were, strategic recruitments as well as an office move. And there was actually a question about the office move. Could you just share your thoughts on, you know, you've just joined Africa Oil, and you're trying to, take us forward on the next, value creation step. What, what was that process all about? What drove you for those recruitments, and, and the reorganization, and why the office move?
Right up front, because the company found itself in the COVID period, moving out of what was apparently a very appropriate office into an office that was suboptimal, let's say, once the COVID restrictions were released. And it was office, it yes, it was very cheap, but it was actually unworkable for a company trying to do what are often confidential negotiations. The lease was coming up, and we managed to get a very a good lease on the on the current office, which is a much more appropriate working working environment. So that's an easy easy one to answer.
The other one, though, on the recruitment of the individuals, and you can see three of them sitting there, is that it for me, it is not possible to do really complex transactions, and they are complex, the transactions that we are doing, purely by outsourcing, principally your legal work to people because they're not bought in to the overall process. Having a key commercial person in Oliver, you can raise your hand, opens the sort of brain mindset to come up with the rather complex transactions that we are doing. So we decided to bring in the skill set because you cannot access that just by drawing down legal work or whatever.
Now, we still do legal work, but when I looked at the original G&A that the company incurred in the year prior to me, it was very significant that it was external, dominantly legal and some technical advice, and that, for me, isn't an optimal way of running a business that is gonna try to grow itself. Does that answer the question, Shane?
Oliver, and we have Joan sitting here as well. I think, Oliver, you joined in September or October last year?
September of 2023, that's right.
Joan joined in December.
Yep.
It was a baptism of fire for both of you, wasn't it? I don't think you had much of a Christmas.
That is a fair statement.
Yeah.
Sorry.
It's been a busy few months.
I suppose you two were critical to delivering two strategic farm down transactions, and both in Orange Basin, and I suppose if you want to give it a headline transaction, I mean, these potentially deal with hundreds of millions of dollars of value at the end of the day.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I mean, was that experience, obviously, at the end of the day, good, but anything you want to add?
Well, I think it's, you know, as Roger outlined the strategy, I think the point is, strategies are great, but you have to execute.
Yeah.
Right? And one of the biggest challenges, as we know, for the sector is raising capital, and particularly raising capital for big development projects. So again, to Roger's point, you've got a world-class asset, but you've got to fund it, right? So I think we all, fair to say, relished the challenge of helping Impact with its funding model, right? So, yeah, critical, I think, right?
Yeah. Very good. Thank you. John, if I may, I'll come back to you. There are a number of questions that are really, sort of addressed to you and the board. And there are numerous questions on share buybacks, but I wanna bring them all together under one heading: capital allocation, and then from that, leading to dividends and share buybacks. So one question has really been: well, guys, you know, you did share buybacks, but it was up and down. You started, you stopped. What is the board's thinking in when it comes to discussing this program with management and executing? Because ultimately, you have to approve it. Can you please share your thoughts?
Yeah, I hate to repeat myself, but it's disciplined capital allocation. And we have to—in looking at the buyback, we have to take a view of not a one-year look ahead perspective. We take a multi-year time horizon perspective. And in order to take that view and build a sustainable, robust business, it's extremely important, and I think the board are unanimous on this, and I think management agree, that you have to have a strong balance sheet. And so I think that is always a factor in deciding on the NCIB, the normal course issuer bid, and the amount of money spent and the pace at which it's spent.
There's a recognition that our shares are undervalued, and one of the reasons that you engage in a normal course issuer bid is that you view the investment in your own shares, the buyback, as a good investment. However, that has to be balanced. For instance, when you look at the pace and timing, I know we were criticized that we stopped the buybacks for a period of time, but that was with a view to operational and commercial aspects. For example, the board didn't view share repurchase as prudent use of capital last year, while we were waiting for clarity around Impact's capital requirements for 2024. As Roger has already stated, the strategic farm down agreement between Impact and TotalEnergies, announced in January, gave us the clarity and confidence to restart share repurchases earlier this year, and we've continued at a pace.
And I think you've seen the weekly reports of the number of shares we've been buying under the plan. On a go-forward basis, the directors, in conjunction with management, are always considering liquidity, considering some of the transactions we may be considering, and the impact that might have on our balance sheet and our cash resources, and also, obviously, our share price. So these are all factors we are constantly looking at, but that's basically the approach that the board has taken.
A few comments. There's one particular participant, Nicholas, who's made a few comments, and I think it's fair to say that there are shareholders that remain bitterly disappointed with the share price performance. But, you know, we do continue delivering, and I think it's important to highlight that at the end of the day, you know, we have to make strategic decisions and execute, and take the company forward. But the environment has changed a lot as well, and perhaps, Roger and John, you wanna share your thoughts. Is it fair to say that the upstream independent E&P sector has changed, I mean, you guys have been involved in the sector for decades. Do you see any unique challenges that are facing you, more recent challenges in the last few years? Has the sector changed?
How's that for passing the buck? Yeah.
Well, the whole sector has changed. You know, anyone who's read my resume will see that I, you know, I started off with Exxon into independence all around the world, then into Yukos in Russia, then back into various private equity vehicles, then into BG all around the world. And as we've gone through my career, the sector has significantly changed, and the perceptions of the sector have changed. And this company is going through a transformation of its strategy, which will place it in a position to be incredibly competitive in the strategy that I believe will create significant shareholder value in the next phase.
But it's not something that you can do walking into the office last July, the eighth or whatever it was, and suddenly say, "Well, this is the strategy going forward, and we'll change it tomorrow." It isn't like that. You have to position yourself, and you have seen that this company is stepping in a particular direction, and we have reached a milestone by de-risking the entirety of the balance sheet, and we have no CapEx going forward. We are completely carried through everything. And that's a very important place to be, and that probably should point people to think about what we're gonna probably do with the company going forward. But that would be forward-looking, and we can't talk about that.
But we are positioning ourselves to what we and the board, the executive and the board, think is an appropriate creation of an appropriate vehicle that will be best suited to the new world that is out there.
Thank you, Roger. That is well received. There are many comments on here. There's one from Wolfgang. I'll just read it out. He says, "I think we see a weak AOI share price because Africa Oil is not offering a strategy from where and how we will get the future production to lift from around 20,000 barrels per day to 50,000 barrels per day." Well, I suppose the Orange Basin and this potential Venus development is something to look forward to, right? Roger, any thoughts on your outlook for-
Well, the frustration that we face with the existing asset portfolio is that, is obviously Venus, and actually the other discovery on the block, which is Mangetti. Because of the way that we hold the asset via Impact, and the way that Total are managing it, and news flow from that, we know what's down there, but we have to work with the operator, and the operator is frankly restricting information that is coming out.
Now, there has been a gate that has been opened, though, as they have started to talk about it, and there was a presentation about a month ago, a month and a half now, probably, done by their senior vice president of exploration, which dealt with the subsurface issues, and you can all download that, and it's a very impressive story. And that's the first time that they've talked about the asset in any really significant way. And then, about a month ago, the CEO of Total did talk about - well, he did say clearly that we're going into a development, and there will be two FPSOs.
Unfortunately, it was reported that the production is, the first phase of production is gonna be 180,000 barrels a day gross. In actual fact, that is 180,000 barrels a day per FPSO. You know, the news writers got that wrong. So there is going to be information that is coming, but we can't leak it. We can't leak it all out because we are in the process of closing our transaction with Total. It's not something that we would do to go against the legal requirements of a JOA, and we can only work with the operator in pursuing that opportunity. But that is a significant frustration, that we can't tell everyone what we have, what we know is down there.
Yeah. There's some conflicting comments on here. I do have some shareholders who are saying that buybacks aren't doing... Well, you know, they're not helping with the share price. What are you doing? You pay more dividends. And then I also have investors who are basically making comments along the lines of, "Why aren't you doing more buybacks?" And I think that's, that sort of conflict, those contradictory statements, are obviously some of the issues we or the board grapples with as well, right? Getting the right capital allocation. Just saying that, obviously, there are two camps out there, those in favor of buybacks and those in favor of dividends.
But Shahin, the critical thing, and I'm sorry to cut across you, is exactly what John said.
Yeah.
Right at the moment, we know that the sum of the NAV of our assets gets nowhere near equaling what the market capitalization of this company is going forward. And so, as an investment for us, it's, I was gonna say a no-brainer, but it's an incredibly attractive investment, buying our own stock back, because we are sure of the underlying NAV of the assets.
Very good. Another question from the webcast platform. It's from Borja: "Hi, as a shareholder, I love it when executive teams have long-term views, but I also love it when they are willing to sell the company.
Well, actually, I'll, I'll answer that one-
Yeah
... because when I came in in July, we worked on the strategy that we're now executing, and going through it, which perhaps isn't 100% clear to everyone what it is. And what I agreed with the board is that we'd make every little step, and we would analyze whether it was still better to continue down the strategy or, because we're now focused on four assets, sell them all into the market. And that was my agreement with them, that we could monetize the whole company for more. Where we are at the moment is, and it's a very good question, so we consider it all the time: Is it better just to break the company up and sell it off?
But where we are at the moment is that we are confident that the next step of our strategy will be executable and does fit, as I said before, the new world of E&P companies that are out there, which is gonna be different than what this company did before.
Thank you, Roger. I believe so, but, yeah. Now, hopefully, the shareholders can reflect on that. Look, there are a number of questions, but I think we're getting into the territory of repeating, repetition. I believe we have tackled the main questions put to us at a strategic level. John, thank you so much for joining us today. It's good to see and hear the perspective from the board. I propose that we bring the meeting to a close now. There are a number of questions which are very detailed, and to those shareholders, we did have our Q1 2024 results last week, and we did answer those questions.
So I do encourage you to. And the replay of that should be available on our website later today, and the script is available as well. Do have a look at that as well. And please reach out to me if you still want further clarification. But I thank everyone else, my colleagues here in London. Susan as well, thank you for joining us from Vancouver, Roger from Dubai, and John from Toronto. So thank you all, and we'll finish the meeting at this point. So please disconnect, and goodbye.