Creditors’ future uncertain
Those due money from collapsed oil and gas explorer Tamarind Taranaki aren’t likely to see any of the $360 million the company owes, says the boss of the New Plymouth Chamber of Commerce.
PwC were appointed receivers of the Malaysian-owned company at 9.17am yesterday, shortly before a meeting with creditors was held in New Plymouth, PwC partner John Fisk said.
At the meeting it was decided administrators BorrelliWalsh be appointed as liquidators to investigate the cause of the company’s failure.
PwC will take control of the company’s assets and determine the best way to realise them for the benefit of the creditors, Fisk said.
Taranaki Chamber of Commerce chief executive Arun Chaudhari said he understood 10-15 per cent of the company’s $360m debt was owed to local suppliers.
‘‘It’s not great for local suppliers and it is a big impact for them to absorb,’’ he said. ‘‘Realistically creditors are not looking at recovering any of their money.’’
New Plymouth MP and opposition energy and resources spokesman Jonathan Young said Taranaki-based companies that supported the Tamarind programme would be badly affected by the company’s collapse. ‘‘This [liquidation] is a careful, deliberate and somewhat complex financial process that now must work its way through its various stages and it would be inappropriate to preempt its outcomes,’’ he said.
Young said he hoped the cost of decommissioning the company’s offshore Tui wells would be completed without more cost falling to taxpayers.
‘‘Petroleum companies have their financial capability vetted by law in New Zealand, but Tamarind acquired the Tui field through a loophole, which was discovered by the previous National government. They and the current Labour government moved rapidly to close that through a legislative process in Parliament,’’ he said.
Taranaki Tamarind, which
owned the Tui field, suspended drilling operations in the South Taranaki Basin in September.
The company has been under voluntary administration since November 13 when it was unable to pay suppliers, and company directors had signalled it was ‘‘insolvent, or may become insolvent’’. Singapore-based administrators BorrelliWalsh were appointed and the company was given a 25-day moratorium to gauge whether it could remain operational.
The company, which specialised in buying oil fields late in production life, had struggled to meet financial commitments after it suspended an estimated $300m three-well drilling programme in the Tui field after the first well was declared dry.
The COSL-owned Prospector semi-submersible rig, which had been contracted to late 2019, was moved off site after the dry well was plugged and abandoned.
More problems struck the company when a leak was discovered between the Pateke oilproducing well the company owned in the Tui field and the offshore floating oil production facility, or FPSO, Umuroa.
Tamarind Taranaki had earlier not renewed its contract with BTW Offshore, which owned the Umuroa, after December 31, 2019.