Cairn posts preliminary results

A day after announcing the success of its SNE-5 appraisal well offshore Senegal, the UK’s Cairn Energy on Wednesday filed its preliminary 2016 results.

Pre-tax losses last year came out at USD 152 million, down from USD 498 million in 2015. At the same time, the group reported major progress in the North Sea, where two major projects, Kraken and Catcher, are due to come online this year, and offshore Senegal, where it drilled four new wells at the cost of USD 78 million in 2016.

“Cairn continues to deliver positive progress across its balanced portfolio,” CEO Simon Thompson said in an upbeat note. “The company remains well-positioned to deliver further value for shareholders from multiple catalysts within the portfolio.”

Also on Wednesday, the firm said it had requested an immediate disbursal of some USD 51 million of dividends from its former Indian subsidiary, after an international arbitration confirmed that the money had been unblocked.

The firm is locked in a tax dispute with the Indian government and says that the value of its approximately 10% stake in Cairn India continues to be off limits to it. The company is also seeking some USD 1 billion worth of damages related to that stake through arbitration proceedings under the UK-India Bilateral Investment treaty, Cairn added in a statement.