With the latest oil find by the United Kingdom-based Tullow Oil having reportedly fallen significantly below the company’s pre-drill expectations, expert assessment of its immediate-term prospects is unlikely to bring smiles to the faces of the company’s Board of Directors.
Late in December the company broke news of a ‘strike’ in the Kanuku Block offshore Guyana, at the Carapa-One Well, though the disclosure was quickly followed by a subsequent announcement that the company would not be pursuing commercial exploitation from that discovery. As is customary in the global oil industry, news of Tullow’s decision brought quick reaction from oil analysts with Bloomberg reporting that the outcome of what it said was Tullow’s “first discovery of the new year” triggering a decline in its shares by “as much as 20%.”
Bloomberg said that the disappointing outcome of the Carapa-One drilling operation comes in the wake of what it said was “a calamitous 2019 in which it not only faced a 64% decline in its stock but also had to cope with the resignation of its Chief Executive Officer.” The Bloomberg article went as far as saying that at this stage even the company’s “previous offshore discoveries in Guyana” could be in doubt after those earlier reservoirs were found to contain heavy oil.