Oil and gas exploration company, Tullow, doubled its turnover in the first half of this year, boosted by strong production from southern North Sea assets acquired in 2001.
Tullow yesterday announced turnover of £55 million sterling (€86 million) for the first six months, up from £27.1 million sterling in the same period last year. After tax and exploration costs, this translates into a net profit of £7.5 million, an increase of 62 per cent on 2001.
The company had operating cash flow of £36.9 million, up 120 per cent from last year's first half. Of this, £30 million has been invested in new exploration developments, including further drilling in the southern North Sea in an area where production is due to begin next week.
Tullow has also invested in expanding production in offshore Ivory Coast, where the company's fields began to produce oil in February and gas sales began last month. The company is also drilling wells in India, Bangladesh, Algeria and Romania.
In his chairman's statement, Mr Pat Plunkett said that the first six months had seen "a steady continuation of the transformation of Tullow". He said that the company's performance had demonstrated both the quality of the UK assets and the effectiveness of Tullow's forward sales programme for uncontracted gas.
Tullow managing director, Mr Aidan Heavey, said that a hedging strategy had allowed the company to beat the average spot price for gas by 50 per cent over the first half, despite the weak overall environment for the fuel.
Tullow is not awarding a shareholder dividend but Mr Heavey yesterday reaffirmed the company's desire to deliver a dividend for the full year after its major capital expenditure programme ended in October.
"We said that we would have a look at that in the full-year accounts," he said, forecasting a "positive outcome" for the 12 months.
Looking forward, Mr Heavey said that the company had a "very active" acquisition policy. New interests in both Europe and Africa are currently under consideration, he said. Shares in Tullow closed at 94.5p in London last night, up 2.5p or 2.71 per cent on the day.
