Full-year losses narrow at Irish explorer PetroNeft Resources

Full-year losses narrowed at Irish oil and gas explorer, PetroNeft Resources, narrowed to $7.67 million in the 12 months to the end of December 2015.

The Siberian-focused group reported a pretax loss of $7.67 million last year, as against a loss of $8.37 million in 2014, and a loss of $11.5 million in 2013.

PetroNeft said revenues for 2015 were $2.39 million, including $1.6 million charged to the joint ventures in respect of management services last year.

The company’s main assets are interests in Licence 61 and Licence 67, both of which are in the Tomsk Oblast in Russia.

PetroNeft chief executive Dennis Francis said 2015 was a busy year for the company during which it carried out an extensive drilling programme, in partnership with Oil India.

“We have gained significant experience in horizontal drilling, deepened our understanding of the Licence and have identified additional upside at Sibkrayevskoye and South Arbuzovskoye,” he said.

Drilling is expected to commence on the Sibrayevskoye field in July.

In a note to investors, Davy said Petrofneft’s 2015 accounts show a difficult year for the group due to declining oil prices and lower-than-expected production levels.

Davy said that taking into account the equity share of local company losses, PetroNeft lost €8.4 million last year. It added that recent production data issued by the explorer was encouring.

“The older Tungolskoye and Arbuzovskoye fields performed well during 2015 but development drilling on Tungolskoye was disappointing, resulting in a loss of expected production volumes. However, recent drilling on the South Arbuzovskoye field has yielded more positive drilling outcomes with current production rates at 3,000 barrels per day gross,” it said.