http://www.gulfkeystone.com/ The firms exploration programme in Algeria is going well and "the shares look good value", say the Investors Chronicle. Your comments please. goal.

http://www.iii.co.uk/investment/detail/?display=discussion&code=cotn%3AGKP.L&threshold=0&it=le&action=detail&id=9155322

http://af.reuters.com/article/energyOilNews/idAFL6E8CC66B20120112?pageNumber=2&virtualBrandChannel=0

INTERVIEW-UPDATE 1-Iraq's Kurds see Exxon deal on track, no obstacles

Thu Jan 12, 2012 5:39pm GMT

* Kurds propose amendments to draft oil and gas law (Adds details, quotes, background)

By Jon Hemming

ARBIL, Iraq, Jan 12 (Reuters) - Exxon Mobil Corp's deal with Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdistan government to develop six exploration blocks is on track and there are no obstacles to it proceeding, the region's Natural Resources Minister Ashti Hawrami said on Thursday.

The U.S. company became the first oil major to move into the northern Kurdish region in mid-October when it signed an agreement with the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG).

The Iraqi oil ministry then said the deal was illegal and could result in termination of Exxon's contract to develop the major West Qurna Phase One oilfield in the south.

Iraqi officials later said they were considering sanctions, although they have since remained largely silent on the issue.

"The deal was signed on October 18. It is binding and everybody is working towards that. It's normal, just like any other contract we have with any other company," Hawrami told Reuters in an interview in the Kurdish capital Arbil.

"In the field of exploration, there is a lot of work to be done in the planning and preparation and so on. It only happened very recently so it is early days," he said. "There is nothing standing in the way of this."

Exxon has not commented publicly on the agreement and Iraqi oil officials say the company has not responded to their requests for an explanation.

The deal heightened tensions between Baghdad and Arbil, which have long-running disputes over oil and land, as U.S. troops pulled out of Iraq. Territories disputed by the Kurds and the Arab-led government in Baghdad are considered a potential flashpoint in Iraq.

As well as the deal with Exxon, the KRG was in talks with other oil majors and expected further such deals to be agreed in the next few months.

"If you're talking about the super majors and majors we have some of them like Marathon, Repsol, OMV etc. working here already. More recently Exxon Mobil came in," said Hawrami.

"If you're talking this size companies, then yes, we are talking to a number of them and we think the next few months will lead to some further deals," he said.

"But also some of these companies are looking at acquisitions and consolidations. The market is very buoyant ... we are talking to oil companies and they are also talking to each other, so the situation is very dynamic."

Confidentiality agreements prevented the ministry disclosing which companies were involved in the talks, but, Hawrami said: "When the deal happens we will announce it."

At least one of the six blocks assigned to Exxon lies outside the present formal borders of the KRG, in areas whose control has yet to be agreed by Kurdistan and Baghdad.

As far as the Kurds are concerned, the areas are not disputed but are under KRG control and the Baghdad government should agree to hold a referendum in those areas, delayed since 2007, to resolve the issue.

In any case, Hawrami said, any revenues from the blocks would be shared with the central government, so it should not be an issue.

As much as a third of the oil extracted in northern Iraq is refined locally for domestic use, partly due to late payments from Baghdad for crude pumped into the major pipeline to Turkey, and partly because it reduces the costs of producers.

The present situation was neither in the interests of Baghdad, nor the KRG, he said.

"We would probably get better value by putting everything into the pipeline for export, but then there would have to be a guaranteed payment to actually make sure this works economically for all sides," he said.

Production is expected to reach 1 million bpd by 2015, he said.

At the heart of the issue was the lack of a national oil law to govern the distribution of oil revenues. At present, revenues are pooled and distributed according to population. Kurdistan gets 17 percent of the revenues.

The new draft oil and gas law has faced years of delay. Its adoption has long been considered critical to the success of Iraq's rapidly developing oil sector, although Baghdad has signed multibillion-dollar contracts with global oil majors despite antiquated legal safeguards

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and KRG Prime Minister Barham Salih agreed during talks in Baghdad in October that by Dec. 31, they would either amend a 2007 hydrocarbons law as agreed by all political factions or adopt the 2007 law as is.

But by the end of last year, neither had been done.

"We sat down and did our own review of the 2007 law and the parts we would like to see changed. We sent that back to the office of the prime minister and the (Oil) Minister (Abdul-Kareem) Luaibi and we sent it to parliament in Baghdad highlighting our views," said Hawrami.

"We invited the Ministry of Oil to do the same, so as far as I know the process is back to the parliament, so we'll see."

In the meantime Iraqi Kurdistan is developing its resources and the capability to export crude to international markets.

Hawrami said the KRG was close to completing a $400 million deal with Genel Energy to build an oil pipeline to link its Tak Tak oilfield with Iraq's export pipeline to Turkey's Mediterranean port of Ceyhan.

"Already we are very close to signing our first agreement on a pipeline in Kurdistan to carry about half a million barrels a day and then to expand the capacity to 1,000,000 barrels," he said. "In fact it's been approved - it's more of a question of finalising it within the next week or so."

Genel declined immediate comment on Hawrami's remarks. (Reporting by Jon Hemming; Editing by Jim Loney and Anthony Barker)

Tender for 500K bopd pipeline and option to add another.

12th January 2012
INVITATION TO BID
TENDER NO.: GKPI/SH/2012/ 075
EXPORT PIPELINE MATERIALS PROCUREMENT
Gulf Keystone Petroleum International Ltd (GKPI) is pleased to invite your Company (Bidder) to submit a Bid Proposal for our TENDER NO.: GKPI/SH/2012/075 – Export Pipeline Materials Procurement, for the Shaikan Field Export Pipeline Project, Kurdistan, Iraq. The scope of work shall include, but not limited to, the manufacture and supply of 122km x 36” diameter pipeline, designed to a maximum operating pressure of 95 bar (ANSI #600 system), which shall provide an overall pipeline capacity in excess of 500,000 bopd. An option to provide an additional 122km x 36” diameter pipeline is also required.
A follow-up invitation to bid for our TENDER NO.: GKPI/SH/2012/076 – Export Pipeline Site Construction & Installation, for the Shaikan Field Export Pipeline Project, will be issued shortly.

500K bopd + option for another 500K bopd pipeline.

Looks to me like someone is going to make a bid for GKP's share of the Shaikan field as the minimum, perhaps the whole company at top level.

This would tie in with rumours of 900p a share (which would be someone like Exxon taking Shaikan and allowing GKP to continue with their other prospects) and then rumours of 1400p or more, which would be a simple total takeover of GKP.

Gibby - How does it go????????
YeeeeeeeeeeeeeeHHaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!
KKeeeeeerrrrrrrrrrcccccchhhhhhiiiiiinnnnnnng!!!!

ditto that adacol :-0))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

Sat on hands first thing as panic set in when seeing sp go to300p want to buy back what I sold yesterday.......hope it comes back to normal around 9ish

:) Lovely

Can it break 300p today..?

286p now rush gone through

http://www.platts.com/weblog/oilblog/2012/01/13/post_6.html

The Barrel
Could Sinopec be Gulf Keystone's mystery suitor?
By Tamsin Carlisle on January 13, 2012 1:02 AM | No Comments | No TrackBacks
Takeover intrigue is swirling around Bermuda-registered Gulf Keystone Petroleum after the company's market value surged to a record GBP2.28 billion ($3.51 billion) in hectic trading earlier this week on the AIM market of the London Stock Exchange.

The stock has since retreated on profit-taking, with most investors apparently none the wiser about who might be lining up an offer for Gulf Keystone or its giant Shaikan heavy-oil field in Iraqi Kurdistan.

The chief suspects include some of the world's biggest international oil companies, with US-based ExxonMobil and Chevron heading the list.

Genel Energy, the Anglo-Turkish independent led by former BP CEO Tony Hayward, also has been proposed by some as possibly preparing a bid.

The FTSE company, formed in November through a merger between UK investment vehicle Vallares and Turkey's Genel Enerji, happens to be Gulf Keystone's partner in Kurdistan's Ber Bahr exploration block, on trend with Shaikan. Genel puts the untested resource potential of the block at 1.5 billion barrels of oil, Gulf Keystone disclosed on Monday.

Gulf Keystone itself set off the day-long stock market frenzy with a cryptic public statement pointing to the contractual validity of Kurdish Regional Government options to farm out its carried interests in Shaikan and other oil blocks to third parties. Otherwise, the company is acting coy.

Reached late Tuesday by Platts, Gulf Keystone CEO Todd Kozel would say only that any development potentially affecting the company's share price would be announced through "proper channels".

Missing in action

KRG officials have been unreachable. Key members of the regional government's natural resources department remain missing in action, their multiple cell phones with Iraqi and UK numbers turned off. The whereabouts of Gulf Keystone's country manager for Kurdistan is likewise unknown, even to his friends.

Are government and company officials huddled in a meeting at a secret location? All signs point in that general direction, but what precise geographical location would that be?

Ruled out

For starters, Genel's London head office can be crossed off the list. The high-flying start-up with about $2 billion of cash reserves is well capitalized for what it is.: a small, cash-flow driven independent oil producer. But at this point it has neither the financial nor tehcnical depth to take on the full-field development of Shaikan, a world-class deposit of 10 billion barrels or more of heavy crude.

Rather, the post-merger Genel is tightly focused on realizing the significant upside potential of its existing assets, including its 25% stake in Kurdistan's first producing oil field, Tawke. On Tuesday, Genel said a new independent appraisal had boosted Tawke's estimated proven and probable oil reserves by 78% to more than half a billion barrels.

Also off the list for now is Chevron's global headquarters in San Ramon, California.

The international supermajor is not among those, including rival ExxonMobil, that have signed services agreements with Baghdad to develop and rehabilitate Iraq's large southern oilfields, so might pursue production sharing deals with the KRG with fewer political risks. Baghdad considers the KRG's contracts illegal and has blacklisted companies signing them from bidding on projects in the rest of Iraq.

But sources close to Chevron have told Platts that the company is not interested in doing business in any part of Iraq.

France's Total, which like Chevron and ExxonMobil has plenty of experience in exploiting heavy crude, has also declared a lack of interest in Shaikan, ruling out takeover discussions in Paris.

That leaves ...

ExxonMobil, which reportedly has an exploration and production license for a Kurdish block adjacent to Shaikan, is another matter. It characteristically stated to Platts Tuesday that it never comments on market rumours.

Indeed, it has yet to confirm the KRG's landmark announcement in November that the company had signed contracts for six Kurdish exploration blocks.

However, ExxonMobil typically holds its cards exceedingly close to its chest, so it is too early to conclude that there are no signposts pointing to Irving, Texas.

But what if they point in exactly the opposite direction...to Beijing?

Chinese refining giant Sinopec is Beijing's chosen vehicle for oil investments in Kurdistan, leaving opportunities in the rest of Iraq for other state-controlled oil enterprises such as China National Petroleum Corporation and China National Offshore Oil Corporation.

So far, Baghdad has not taken the drastic step of banning governments whose state-affiliated petroleum entities have signed KRG contracts from doing business in the rest of Iraq.

Sinopec gained its initial foothold in Kurdistan in 2009 by acquiring the Kurdish operations of Addax Petroleum, which was Genel Enerji's partner in developing Kurdistan's second producing field, Taq Taq. It is no secret that the Chinese company is seeking further acquisitions in the region, for which it is willing to pay handsomely.

Moreover, Sinopec operates huge heavy oil refineries in China, and since 2005 has been learning about the upstream end of the business through international partnerships with heavy-oil producers.

In June 2011, Sinopec and Norway's Statoil brought Brazil's technically challenging Peregrino offshore heavy-oil field into production. Also in 2011, Sinopec invested $4/65 billion to buy ConocoPhillip's 9% stake in Canada's biggest oil sands project, Syncrude, after serving a six-year apprenticeship in the country's oil sands sector through a smaller deal.

The KRG might welcome Sinopec as a potential operator for the Shaikan oil field, as China could in time become a valued customer for Kurdish crude.

For his part, Gulf Keystone's Kozel, with limited technical and resources at his disposal, will be looking to cash out on Shaikan with the biggest possible pot of money to fund his next business venture.

The stars seem well aligned for Sinopec to bid for Gulf Keystone or its biggest asset.

Ever enigmatic, ExxonMobil may be eyeing the action, waiting for Beijing to make the first move.

If there is a bid coming it looks like £4 would be an absolute minimum !.

Good morning champers,a bit of a lie in this am.Excellent news and another 10 i see the SP has added 10p,it all seems to be coming together now? Be interesting S4 and BB results are known?

morning cyril, dog will have crossed legs.,.

Trying get my head around this mornings news,so "2 pipelines 0f 500k",1MILLION BOPD.
Sounds like they might have a massive find.lol?

what will happen this afternoon - profit taking - or buy more for monday?? or both - profit taking looks risky at this stage gla

and luncktime??

Possible profit taking later today, if we stay above 270p that will be great for the week !!

proselenies,
A great since the start to the year,is it worth risking being out over the weekend,news coming thick and fast.

cyril, I am not expecting anything too short term, but certainly something in the coming weeks.

Either way its been excellent gains so far, and more to come.