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Maha Energy AB (publ)
8/18/2024
Hello and a warm welcome to Prestreff Direkt with Investor Target. The presentation of Prestreff Direkt is a collaboration between us at Investor Target, Direkt Studios, Stockpicker and Maha Energy. In this broadcast, CEO Kjetil Solbrekke and Roberto Marchiori, financial manager from Rio de Janeiro, will present results and current events during this quarter. As usual, the management will be able to answer questions from those of you who are watching live. Those of you who are watching in the afternoon, or those of you who don't get an answer to your question, can in the afternoon turn to Maha and then to IR. The presentation will continue in English. Kjetil and Roberto, how are things in Rio de Janeiro?
Rio de Janeiro, as we call it here, is the Cidade Maravilhosa, which is the wonderful city. So it's always nice in Rio de Janeiro. Yeah, very nice. Thank you.
Well, Ketil and Roberto, please walk us through, perhaps even by your standards, a very extraordinary and eventful quarter. Go ahead. The scene is yours, guys.
Well, thanks a lot for that. And thanks for a nice introduction. Super happy to be here again and presenting. And thanks for the collaboration with you guys in Stockholm. Yes, it's been an eventful presentation. Let's go through a bit of the disclaimer first, as we have to. Here we go. So, well, there was a quick read on the disclaimer. the two presenters are well known, I think, by now. So if we go then straight to the presentation, as always, we are showing a bit of the highlights. And I will try to put it with a bit of perspective here of what we have been through over the last bit more than a year. I think it's important to start with the DBL transaction as it changed dramatically Maha significantly and laid the foundation for what we have been doing this year and ever since. It's created the clear link to 3R, which is important. I'll come back to that. We also had the entry into Venezuela, which is again laid the foundation for what we have been working on this year. And we exited Oman, which slided into this year, more formal reasons. But basically, all that was done last year. And it meant that we now had a completely new company ready for a very different agenda than what had been previously in Baja. And this is what we have been working on this year. In addition, I would say, as you see on the last events here, and I will go through them very quickly, we have also done a tremendous job over the last quarter and subsequent weeks and months on the balance sheet. And I think what we see today is a company very well prepared for the remaining of the year and for the next year. We have several opportunities. We are in a very good financial position. So this year, just a quick reminder, we bought the shares in 3R Petroleum. And the idea was that we thought it's about time we can really do a consolidation. We continued our efforts in Venezuela, as we described. And we made the closing of the transaction. We have done our changes in the balance sheet, as Robert will talk more about. And just today, we have also initiated a buyback program, very much on a lot of requests from actually shareholders. And of course, as you all know, this was approved by the AGM in May. So I think it's good to see that actually what we laid the foundation for last year is what we have been focused on doing this whole year. And I'm very happy to see the results so far, and I'm sure there will be much more coming in this quarter and next last quarter. So next one, a bit more into 3R. I think we've been through this on several occasions already. But I think a good story can never be repeated too many times. I think we, first of all, we knew 3R very well. I think we also were very comfortable with the Enalta portfolio and the Enalta management, people that we have good knowledge of and are very comfortable with. I think 3R, just to repeat that, was founded by Starboard and DBO. And with the merger between Maha and DBO, we brought again the link into 3R with us. And for Maha, the DBO transaction has been very nice, a very good transaction. Basically paid something like... $29.5 million and received in shares in 3R a value equal to $48.3 million in less than a year. I think that says a lot about that transaction in itself, but I think the most important thing was also the link into 3R and what we think we can create out of this combined company. I'll come more into that on the next page, but let me first just mention here these synergies that are identified by Enalta through the capital structure, capital allocation, basically meaning that we think this new company or Enalta, to be very precise, and we agree, believes that there's a lot of synergies in just reorganizing the debt and the capital structure. So this counts for half a billion dollars. There is another half a billion dollar in synergies and optimizations on the operations and on the new investments. And also, you believe there is a gain in selling of the oil as we can blend into a better blend. And we also have more regular cargoes, which also has a value in the market. So going to the next page. So this new company, what is this? new company. I think we already talked about the synergies. There's a lot of synergies. There would always be synergies when two companies like this merge. I've been through it many times, and it's important to take the synergies and realize them. So this is now in the hands of the new management, and I'm very comfortable that that will go ahead. I think the other thing is that we have now an even more diversified growth from actually more than one third of all the wells in Brazil are inside this company and are delivering growth going forward. I think the combined management team, as we said, I think it's a very good team and I'm very confident that they will produce good results. Just a quick look at some of the numbers that you see on the page here. Won't repeat everything, you can read it yourself. But highlighting, of course, 1.8 billion US dollar in EBITDA estimated by Bloomberg next year says a lot. There's a lot of cash coming in. And that is supported, of course, by an expected growth in production from about 60,000, as we see currently, up to 111,000 barrels. We all know there can be delays in some of this, but I'm very comfortable. I'm very comfortable about the potential for this kind of growth. So I don't think these numbers are taking out all the fantasy. In a way, this is very realistic. numbers on what we can expect and it will create a fantastic cash flow for this company and then I would say as a significant shareholder or CEO in a company with a significant shareholding position in 3R and Alta I expect My expectation is that this will yield a lot of dividend payments going forward. So I think we will be, as shareholders, excited to see the future of this combined company. And I think it will benefit the shareholders in Maha to a great extent. So let's go to some of the other actions here quite quickly. Illinois, again, I must say, our... Very limited team of a couple of professionals in Illinois are delivering again. We have produced, we have drilled three new wells last year. They have delivered and according to our expectation. And we are now completing three more wells. And of course, I hope that they will fall in line with the same kind of results as we saw last year. So we can see an interesting growth quarter by quarter and so on in Illinois. And the good thing is not only our production increasing, but we are able to do this without adding manpower, without adding much cost. So basically that means that the production or the cost per barrel is actually going down. So congratulations to Alan and his team in Illinois. Fantastic, well done job. Going to the next one. I think there is a lot of questions on Venezuela. And of course, I know also that the most interesting questions, I think you all know that I cannot answer. And not only because I wouldn't be able to do for market reasons, but also because we probably, there's a lot of things here we don't know exactly what's going to happen and how it's going to play out, whatever is happening in Venezuela on the political side. What I'm very comfortable about, and I'm in daily communication with the authorities in Brazil, in Norway, and also representatives, not from the authorities, but in Venezuela. And I'm very comfortable that we will see progress in Venezuela this year. I actually do expect to get licenses this year from the US. I don't have any indication about timing on this and so on, but my expectation is that this is going to happen. There is no guarantee in this, of course, but I'm very positive based on the signals I get that we are favorably looked upon. I think all the work we've done there, I've been there several times talking to the State Department. I am comfortable that we will move forward in Venezuela And with the authorities, we are discussing all the agreements that they need to get in place that this is moving forward. Yes, I would love it to see it happen much faster, but that's how it is. I think we are making sure that this is done properly, done carefully, and that we have a good control of the outcome of these discussions. So we have been mainly focusing on our business plan. which I'm very comfortable that we will initiate. We are very quickly looking into changing the lift mechanisms in the wells. I think it will have a tremendous result. We will, however, test well by well. We're not going to start on a on a huge CapEx program sinking a lot of money here, before we have more confidence about the potential. The potential is in each and every single well, and there is a lot of them, and we are ready to move forward on all these wells. Just a quick look at the next page. which I think also you have seen several times. I mean, I think there is no doubt about, you know, nobody has any doubts about there's a lot of oil in Venezuela. But just a reminder, the millions of billions of barrels that basically is in place in these reserves is mind-blowing. So again, just 1% increase in the recovery factor represents 86 million barrels of oil in reserves. I'm very confident that we're going to contribute to increased productivity, meaning producing the barrels from the fields more quickly than what is being done today with 1,000 barrels per day, or actually it's moving a bit up and down. I think we will increase that significantly up to in the order of at least 20,000 barrels per day and potentially even more. But that is something we need to prove. We need to test. We are very open about that. We have to do this test. It could take more time. We could be lucky and take less time. But that's basically how we're going to do it. But the potential is very, very large. And I'm very comfortable that we are working on the right issues. And what we need is the licenses and the progress in Venezuela on all areas. Okay. next so this is I think I will end here I think I am a CEO and the in a close collaboration with a very active board, with large shareholders, very confident about the value potential of upside in our portfolio. I think today, or at the end of the quarter, our company is valued at the stock exchange more or less equal to what we have of net cash and shares in Europe. I think today certainly that is the case. I think there is more value in the company with cash and shares in 3R than what the market cap says. I'll leave that a bit for my good colleague here, Roberto, as he has done a tremendous good job on the balance sheet and also preparing for the buyback. There's not so much to say about the buyback. I think it's something that we plan to do, and we got the formal approval from the agent. Now it's about executing it, and I leave that to Roberto to go through. But I think, as a final remark here, the upside in 3R revaluation and the upside in Venezuela, I think is tremendous. And I think as shareholders, I think we're looking forward to a super exciting autumn and a super exciting start on 2025. So with this, I hand it over to you, Roberto.
Thank you, Gertrude. And before we jump in the financial highlights section, I would just like to make a quick disclaimer here, because during Q2, we signed the agreement with 3R. So basically, our Brazilian entity was classified as asset held for sale. So moving forward, and if you go back in Q1, you will see some differences when we see the SG&A accounts, because now we are not considering in terms of consolidation the results of these Brazilian entities. So starting here in the financial highlights, looking at the income statement, basically, if you start in the left side of the page, we have a stable production in Illinois Basin. And now, as Jet was mentioning before, we are looking forward to expecting an increase in terms of production. If you compare, we have a significant increase during Q2 last year after we decided to move forward with this new ELS program. Basically, this was also supported by a higher oil price during the quarter, if you compare last year, which, of course, has a revenue increase of around 65% if you compare to last year's second quarter. And this is very important because we have this $1.1 million operating net back that support our cash flow and our GNA quarter over quarter. So we can be prepared for our next acquisitions slash investments. Going to the EBITDA, we have a negative EBITDA of around $860,000. mainly explained by non-recurring events related to M&A and legal fees during the quarter. And a net result of mine, a negative $22.7 million, which I'm going to explain later, but basically impacted by 3R share unrealized loss. So basically, if you look at the daily pro forma production, we have a stable production in Illinois. but a very significant increase if you look at last year quarter. And this, of course, is being totally reflecting the net revenue. When you look at stable net revenue of around 1.2% increase quarter over quarter and a 65% increase comparing last year. Our EBITDA, as I was mentioning before, I'm going to show you later, but we were mainly impacted by or during current events during the quarter as we were closing 3R transaction and also Venezuela project. And we have this net income of minus negative $22 million, mainly explained by 3R share price decrease and as a non-realized loss. So moving forward here, we're gonna show a little bit about our financial income, which excluding 3R share price was pretty stable. only considering our cash investments. And we have, in the previous quarter, an unrealized gain of $9.2 million. And if you look below in the financial expenses, we also have a decrease in terms of financial expenses because as we are amortizing our debt, these expenses are decreasing over time. And then we have, during this second quarter, unrealized loss of $20 million. because of 3R share price decrease. But we still are pretty confident on the share price of 3R, even though we still exposed to this volatility going forward. And these end up with a net financial result of around $20 million loss, but unrealized loss during the quarter. And now, like I made a disclaimer before, If you look at our share of income from investment and associate, we are classifying this result of 3R offshore as asset held for sale. So moving forward, we won't see this line anymore in our reports. So moving forward here, talking a little bit about our bank debt, as Jet should give you already a spoiler. After Q2, we were working to try to optimize our capital structure. As you know, we have this $24 million end of June, a very expensive interest rate, and we work to issue a new debt of $15 million in August in order to reduce our cost of debt and also give more flexibility in terms of availability of cash. So basically, We repay this old debt using our cash collateral, and this will save us going forward around $6,000, showing the ability of enhancing and optimizing our capital structure going forward. And about our shareholders' equity and also our assets, they were basically impacted by this unrealized loss in 3R share price. uh and we expect this uh getting better going forward about the gna we looking the chart here before we have around 1.3 million dollars recurring expense and 1.4 million dollars of non-recurring expenses mainly related to this mna and legal costs mainly related we are and also petro-donated transactions. And you can see a small decrease, quarter over quarter of around 15%. So we imagine this will stabilize as soon as we close these transactions and as soon as we have our production in place. Moving on to CapEx, as Jethro also mentioned, We have this $6,000 approximately of investments in Illinois. Basically, after we approved this wealth trading program last year, and now for this year, we also approve another round of investments. Here, going to the cash flow review, I think this slide is very important to show what's happened with our capital structure and our cash availability. So if you start from the left to the right, we end up last quarter with around $98 million in net cash plus short-term investments, which were basically our cash plus 3R share investment. And if you take a look in the cash flow from operations, basically we have the impact of an active $1.5 million, mainly explained by our negative EBITDA during the quarter, and also some non-cash adjustments. In terms of cash flow for investing, we have around a negative $3.6 million, mainly explained by our new investment in 3R Offshore, the venture to finance Papaterra, and also the CAPEX related to Illinois drilling program. And moving to cash flow from finance, basically we have our debt service from the old debt that we used to have. And also we received the first installments of amortization in our 3R debenture of around $1 million. And then we have a reclassification of 3R offshore debenture from long-term investment to short-term investment. So this will help with the balance of short-term investments. And then we have this unrealized loss of $20 million in 3R share price. ending up with around $102 million in cash plus investments and a net cash position by the end of June of $79 million approximately of this net cash plus short-term investments. But as Joshua was mentioning before, I think the most exciting happened as a subsequent events, basically looking for this optimization within our capital structure We issued a $15 million debt at attractive terms in terms of cost of debt to enhance our liquidity and also reduce the cost of debt that we were burning our cash flow. So basically, we are now having a 6.9% interest rate when you compare to past debt that we used to have 13.5%, almost a 50% reduction in terms of cost of debt. And also this will generate us around $60,000 savings going forward until March 2025. And also very important enhancement in our capital structure is the additional 3R shares that we receive as payment between 3R merged with Enalta. This $49 million is considering end of June price. But if you look today, this is even higher. So considering a pro forma cash flow plus short term investments, we will end up with around $127 million net cash plus short investments, proving that we are with a strong balance sheet going forward for potential new transactions. And now as closing remarks, as we already mentioned before, we are always looking to enhance and optimize our capital structure. So we mentioned this debt we fully repaid during August, using only our cash collateral that was already restricted cash, generating a future savings of around $600,000. And at the same time, issuing this new $15 million debt that will not only reduce our cost of debt, but also improve our liquidity. Also, we have the solidly performed capital structure of around $142 million in cash plus investments. And additionally, on top of that, we also have $42 million approximately in earnouts to collect going forward. And looking forward, as Jethro also mentioned, in order to give more flexibility regarding our equity and also to optimize our capital structure, we also initiate this share-by-back program to reproduce up to 10% of our shares. Additionally, we are still waiting on a license, which we are very confident that we will get the license very soon and start Operation Petrodaneta. Also, now we have this significant dry powder to look and pursue with other attractive M&A transactions going forward. And of course, we are very engaged in opportunities throughout Latin America for always focusing in value generation for our shareholders. So, Giaccio, I guess the word again.
No, I guess we are open for questions. I'm sure you have some for us.
Yes, Ketil and Roberto, we have received a lot of questions before this broadcast and obviously there are questions that are streaming in now. And unsurprisingly, we will kick off with Venezuela. And one of the questions, obviously, you are limited in what you can say and that's basically that it's uncharted territory, I take it. But could you please provide us with an indication of the total upfront capital you plan to invest in Venezuela before these operations become self-funding. And I believe you mentioned that you are walking it slowly when it comes to drilling and expenditure. But there must be an estimate on the total before you get some revenue.
Yeah, but this is something we haven't in detail decided upon in the board yet. So we are still working on the numbers. But let me give you some indications here just to... perhaps answer with at least some estimates that we have. So I think what we expect is that there will be a cost of approximately $3 million per test of these wells. And we plan to at least start with, and they will not start with five simultaneously. We start with a program of testing five wells in what we call the deep basement wells in La Paz. And then the math should be fairly simple. Three times five is what we expect to spend over that. But we do expect to get revenues early on. But that depends a bit on what kind of offtake agreement we will get. So that's why it is a bit tricky to say. But let's say at least, OK, if we don't have any kind of offtake or any revenues in that period, you're talking about $15 million, right, for the testing program. And then we will also test two wells in the southeast, which is a different type of oil. And I would say that we haven't done all the final calculations on the cost there, but there could be a somewhat higher cost on some of these wells. They have other issues that we need to take care of, H2S among others. This is very operationally not a big problem, but we just have to be well prepared for it. And so if we add a million dollars per well there, okay, so let's add another eight million. on top of the 15. And again, the math should be fairly simple. You're looking at 23, maybe then to $25 million in case you are not getting any sort of offtake or any revenues in that testing period, which is our aim. So I think that gives you at least something to do some calculations on.
And if I recall from the beginning of your presentation here, you did elaborate a little bit of the current value where you looked at the Maha's cash position and its equity stakes. And was I right in understanding that in that case, you have Venezuela in there more or less for free?
Absolutely. And, you know, I I hate to see it that way, but that's the reality, I think. And I think I'm at least personally, and as one of the larger personal shareholders in the company, I'm very confident about the value potential in Venezuela, about what we are doing. I'm very comfortable with the technical evaluations that we're doing. And of course, What I cannot say anything about is how soon, how long time will it take before we get all the licenses and so on. It's in the hands of others. But we are working also on that to increase the chances for getting it as quickly as possible.
And if we move on to licenses, this is also a question coming in here. If you could elaborate on the likely terms of the OFAC special license, do you expect that it will be similar to Mariel and Prom EI expiry after two years? And may I expose my ignorance here and just see that? Sometimes it's difficult to be a mind reader of the authorities, but maybe you are in some sort of negotiations so you would know terms and conditions.
Yeah, OK, perfect. That's a great question. And I think... So my response, I mean, I worked for the Norwegian government, so I know how government works. And I think that, so we don't expect anything else than what Mario Brom has received on the positive side, on the negative sides, and so on. I think that the U.S. government wants to, in any circumstance, I would say, in any potential future, they would like to secure themselves and not sort of just, yeah, giving licenses for 20 years and so on, which is really natural. But I think behind this, there would be a policy. And I think that what we have seen, the US attempt to kind of, you know, with the license 44, giving a general license to operate on the EMP, I think this is happening for a reason. And that reason is that they basically seen that what they have done previously hasn't really worked. And also, I must say, I think they would very much like to get the oil out of Venezuela. So I think there are these two driving interests behind the U.S. policy, which, of course, I cannot guarantee that's how it is, but that's my reading. And that's not going to change in this period. So for that reason, I expect that once you get the license, I think the chances for getting this renewed after two years and so on and so on and so on is extremely high.
Mm-hmm. So the big hurdle is to get the license, one should say.
I think so. And I think it's more, actually, I'm very, you know, should always be careful on these kind of calls, you know, because we don't know. We cannot read into the future. But I, with all the dialogue I've had, I'm very confident that we are very high on the list. in the State Department. I was there in July, and we were very well received. And so my basis is not just the hope and praise. It's basically based on the feedback I get from the State Department, from the authorities, and so on. And I'm very confident that we will get the license.
A portion of the earnouts from Petro Reconcavo depends on the realization of synergies. You had a slide where you discussed synergies in general terms. Could you comment on the likelihood of these synergies-based payments being triggered?
Just to clarify, you said Petru Concavoy. I guess you are referring to 3R in and out. Yeah, you're referring to 3R, right? Otherwise, I would be unsure about the answer. But no, so I think with 3R... Well, first of all, it's in the hands of this other management team now. I think we are very comfortable about the estimation of a bit more than half a billion dollars in savings on the capital structure. I think, without going into too much details, I think there are there are things to be done there linked to how the tax efficiency and how the debt is structured between the different companies within the new company's portfolio. And so we are very comfortable that that is something which is reasonable and achievable. I think when it comes to the operations, I think that also It almost goes without saying that that's been the driver behind the big mergers that we have seen for decades between the big companies and was, for my own sake, with Statoil and Hydro. There will be always synergies in management and so on that you can realize. And you will have more assets to play with, which also means that you have... but you are increasing the chance or you're reducing the chance of having equipment being idle for a longer period of time. So basically, I think all of these things, it's fairly straightforward synergies on operations, on CapEx being more efficient in the operations, and having a more lean and mean management. So I think this thing is fairly straightforward. And I think the capital structure, as I said, is well based on basically what you can do with the debts.
Thank you for that. And if I may switch geographical focus, I would like to look at the Illinois holdings here. You mentioned here the production was up to more than 50% due to a completion of development program. Are there more programs ahead or shall we expect the going rate to be the 232 barrels equivalent per day. And basically what I'm looking for here is would the US asset here or Illinois, will that be a stable contributor or will it be more to come, but then also more costs?
No, very good question. I think a great opportunity for me to highlight how this works. So the U.S. wells and the play, the Mississippi play, as we call it, is basically known by having these wells that are coming on stream. We have been able to increase kind of what we what we call the type curve somewhat with with being better in applying the right kind of fracking tactics, so to speak. based on results where we have used tracers in some of the wells to understand really where we have to contribute the contribution in production, from which layers and so on. So that actually increased our results in the last couple of wells. But anyway, regardless of what you do with the fracking and so on, the type curve here is kind of indicating you a very high or like a high initial production of 100 barrels or in that range per well for the initial production period which can be as short as a month or up to three months and then you have a quite quickly decline so so in other words you will not maintain in the production level in Illinois without drilling new wells we have existing more than I think about 20 well targets. These are currently also being re-evaluated as always based on the information from the later wells. But I'm very confident that we have significant new targets and I'm also very confident that we will drill more wells. We're discussing a bit on how many new wells and I think that will be a decision taken by the administration and the board on basically an alternative use of that cash. I think the payback here is in the order of a year, as we're quite happy with that. But that is, of course, also oil price related. So I think if oil price stays strong and we believe that this is going to continue, it makes a lot of sense to let our excellent team in Illinois continue to drill more wells and maybe this time we can look at an even larger portfolio of wells. But that is something we haven't decided yet. We'll come back to that later.
Thank you. And we have an additional question from a viewer here regarding the 3i synergies. And that is, could you remind us or inform us whether there is any oil price related hurdles in this, well, synergies and cooperation?
No, I am not aware. I have to look at Roberto here. But the things that we have mentioned, no, there is nothing there. I mean, this oil price linked... kind of issues that we have had before has been linked to the selling of assets from Petrol Konkar Borg, where the price was kind of then depending on the earn out, was depending on oil price levels. And that is running continued, but with three R synergies. This is basically with the balance sheets and cleaning up or reorganizing the balance sheet, reducing the cost of capital in the company. and operating more efficiently and operating the investments more efficiently going forward. And there is a small gain on selling the oil as a result of having a more ongoing, continuous production, which means that you are a more attractive seller of oil.
And if we then focus here on the share transaction with 3R, you are a proper minority owner. We're just shy of 5%. How should I view that as a humble just observer of the market? Is this a financial or an industrial investment?
You have no need to be humble. I think you're a very knowledgeable guy, as far as I see. But I think I think it goes with how it's structured in our balance sheet. It's held as, what do you say, the words were, assets for sale. It's a short-term investment, meaning that it's expected, at least that we hold it, not necessarily more than 12 months. So that's the formal part of this. That's how it is in our accounting. I think I would say that we have no rush in selling these shares. I believe that the potential for the three-hour share price should be at least double of what we see today. So, of course, we are in no rush. We have a good capital structure and so on. So we would like to see some of the synergies, some of the operational opportunities issues and synergies, and also the growth, which is embedded in the current plans, see them realized. I think that will be reflected in a very strong cash flow. And I think again, that that will be reflected in expected dividends. So I don't have any issues personally to sit on these shares for quite a long time. I think it will yield dividends that we can also apply for new businesses in Maha. And I think in itself, that will create massive interest for the share here in the market in Brazil. So no rush, but formally, yes, it's there as a kind of assets for their investments. Yes.
So you have given yourself a pretty good hand there with a flexibility, an industrial and a financial flexibility that it seems to me.
I like that summary.
Thank you. Could I just look at the share buyback? As I understand it, obviously you can now buy up to 10%. Am I right in understanding that that would be treasury stocks because you will not, well, kill them, so to speak, but you will keep them and you could use them as a currency if you want to make a transaction, an M&A transaction. Is that correct?
Yeah, I think that was correct. That was what we stated very clearly in the press release. I think normally you would think that you start a share buyback program, a buyback program for shares. And you think that, you know, unless something a bit... special comes up where you can use this for a transaction, you would seek to know these shares after a period of time. The flexibility is there and that's good. I think we like to have options, we like to see using or having the flexibility. I think that the main target is basically that this you know, a share buyback program means that each shareholder gets a bigger piece of the pie of what we have in the company. And we are very enthusiastic about what is in the company. So it's in a way that easy, we can do it. And I think, I think that it's been also a request from several shareholders. So I'm happy to say that to each one of you that has written to me and to Jacob, that, yeah, we do read your emails and we do care about what you think. So, and here we were able to deliver on this request.
And just one comment, Gertrude, if I may, it's if we decide and deciding about the canceling the shares, we also need an EGM for approval. Ah, okay. That's true. Very good.
If we then look at the situation here, in a short period of time you have restructured the operations and your geographical footprint with Venezuela, Brazil and the US. And the balance sheet is being restructured and also the shareholder list here. Will 2025 be a year of consolidation or will it be as, let's say, diversified in actions during 2024? And I guess one of the questions here was, what's the M&A pipe looking like?
I have to answer generically on that. I think we do see quite a lot of opportunities in Latin America. I must also say that we, meaning myself, the core team in Maha and the board, I think we have now a lot of experience in evaluating, making this deal happen. We have very good collaboration with the different banks. I think we have flexibility on the financing side that few others have. so i think we're well recognized in the market we are being contacted i would say almost on a daily basis on projects and people wanting us to participate in in different things and deals so So, no, I don't, if consolidation, if you mean by that, you know, that there will be not so much activity. No, I think that we will work hard to continue to develop the portfolio. I think that in the short run, it's a lot linked to what's going to happen with VR. And as a shareholder, we are pushing for what we have already said. I think the other thing is, of course, Venezuela, which I think has tremendous potential, as we have talked about. We're going to deliver on Venezuela. And then, I think, to a degree, we also have more financial flexibility, which Roberto has already said we have. We will, of course, look into other great opportunities. I think we'll always look for those opportunities where we can think that we have a different angle in something where... which we are familiar with, taking perhaps more risk or some different risk than others. But then basically see that, well, it's because we are comfortable in Latin America. We understand Latin America. We have a good network in Latin America. And I think that will provide us with very good deal opportunities going forward.
Excellent. Thank you for that. So the conclusion there would be, it's more to come if the right opportunity arises, one could say. Yes. Kjetilen Roberto, thank you for this presentation. Very intriguing, very exciting, I must say. And more to come would be the conclusion. So with that, thank you very much. And to all of you who have watched and asked questions, thank you and goodbye!