Jun 2015 Financial News

Phoenix Park IPO weeks away

Jun 25, 2015

The long awaited initial public offering (IPO) in Phoenix Park Gas Processors will be launched within the next few weeks, president of the National Gas Company (NGC) Indar Maharaj said on Tuesday night. Speaking with reporters following a tour of NGC’s facilities at Point Lisas, Maharaj said the prospectus for the IPO has already been submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for review.

“They will review the prospectus and send it back to us with their comments so we can make adjustments. Then we wil send it back to them for a final review and once they are okay with it, they will authorize us to do the IPO. Once that happens, the IPO will be launched,” he said. Maharaj said the IPO would have been ready if issues had not arisen with the First Citizens Bank IPO≥ However, he said, one it is launched citizens will have a fair opportunity to own part of T&T’s energy sector.

He said NGC purchased a 39 per cent stake in Phoenix Park for US$600 million from US oil giant ConocoPhillips in September 2013. “We acquired the shares and invested it in a TTNGL, a local company, and we therefore started the process of  doing an initial public offering of approximately 49 per cent of that 39 per cent to put into the public domain,” he said. He explained that earlier this year, NGC  was given authorization to continue with the IPO process.

Maharaj said NGC plans to expand upstream, midstream and downstream. He said the company has been operating at 99.9 per cent reliability and the recent downgrade from Moody’s investors Services had nothing to do with the its performance. He also said NGC reaped hundreds of millions of dollars in profits after it started marketing its natural gas. At present, 55 per cent of the gas produced in T&T goes to the LNG trains in Point Fortin. NGC owns 10 per cent in Train 1 and 11 per cent in Train 4. 

The purchase of the French-based global energy operator Total’s Exploration and Production (E&P) assets, priced at US$473 million, which was finalised last September 30, “allowed NGC to have a 30 per cent shareholding in Block 2 (c) and an 8.5 per cent in Block 3(a), which allows a production capacity of approximately 15,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day and a gas volume of 220 MMscf/d,” he said.

In addition. NGC had deepened its involvement in the upstream business which comprises a 10 per cent shareholding in the South East Coast Consortium (SECC), 20 per cent shareholding in Trintomar and 15 per cent ownership of  the Teak, Samaan and Poui oilfields located east of Mayaro.
Maharaj said NGC has 120 light industrial customers who get natural gas at subsidized prices. 

Source:
Radhica Sookraj
Trinidad Guardian
Thursday June 25, 2015

http://www.guardian.co.tt/business/2015-06-25/phoenix-park-ipo-weeks-away