Oil Majors Submit Interests To Explore Oil Blocks In Ghana

The energy ministry of Ghana announced that the first exploration licensing round for the nation’s oil reserves has successfully attracted applications from major energy firms.

So far, a total of 16 upstream energy players have applied for exploring one or more of the five prospective blocks, located off the coast of Ghana. The submission of the applications reflects interests of the energy firms for three Western Basin oil blocksthrough competitive bidding route. The other two offshore blocks will be allotted through direct negotiations.

Ghana has been putting in concerted efforts to unlock its additional resources. This in turn will bolster the country’s daily production volumes — presently at 200,000 barrels per day. Energy majors vying for the resource include Exxon Mobil Corporation (NYSE:XOM) , BP plc (NYSE:BP) , TOTAL S.A. (NYSE:TOT) , Eni SpA (NYSE:E) , Kosmos Energy Ltd. (NYSE:KOS) , Sasol Ltd. (NYSE:SSL) ,CNOOC Limited (NYSE:CEO) and Equinor ASA (NYSE:E) . Except Sasol and CNOOC, carrying a Zacks Rank #4 (Sell), all the stocks carry a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).

Although oil pricing scenario is presently weak, the explorers and producers might get incentives to boost operations in Ghana since analysts are expecting the commodity prices to recover in 2019.

In May next year, the supply of Iranian oil across the global market is likely to plummet further. This will be the result of expiry of sanction waivers, issued by the United States to several countries granting them permission to continue importing oil from Iran, by mid-2019. Since, Iran was the fourth largest oil producer in 2017, the loss of massive oil volumes from the global economy will be hard to replace by other producers, in turn aiding the oil prices recovery.

You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

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