Bahrain state oil firm to appoint financial adviser, CEO says

Bahrain’s state oil firm nogaholding is in final talks to appoint a strategy consultant and financial adviser, its chief executive said on Monday, as the indebted country seeks to capitalize on high energy prices and sell or lease out assets.

Nogaholding, the parent of Bahrain’s main state energy companies, issued a request for proposal for an independent financial adviser last week and expects to award it in roughly eight weeks’s time, group CEO Mark Thomas told Reuters.

The aim is to develop an energy strategy within six months and an asset monetization program as soon as next year, he said.

“The independent financial adviser will be looking at asset monetization, our debt and our structure of our debt, looking at opportunities where we can use alternative forms of financing like sustainability-linked loans,” Thomas said.

The adviser will also help nogaholding with a possible national hedging strategy, in coordination with the finance ministry, to protect on the downside and unlock any upside, he added.

“We’ve got very attractive oil prices right now. We generally run a budget, a national budget, at an oil figure of $60-$65” per barrel to break even, he said. 

The strategy consultant, for which an RFP was issued in December, is expected to complete early in the fourth quarter a national energy strategy, a nogaholding operating strategy and a carbon strategy aligned with Bahrain’s goal of net-zero emissions by 2060.

Nogaholding will follow a monetization model similar to regional energy heavyweights Saudi Aramco and Abu Dhabi National Oil Co., Thomas said.