‘Number of FPSO projects due to be awarded soon’

KUCHING: Analysts have projected that a number of floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) projects due to be awarded soon including Eni’s deep-water Agogo project in Angola and Total Energies’ Cameia project in Angola and Suriname project in Maka.

According to AmInvestment Bank Bhd (AmInvestment Bank), oil and gas operators directly exposed to upstream production such as Hibiscus Petroleum Bhd have been benefitting from higher oil prices.

“Moreover, the FPSO sub-sector also stands to benefit given the decimated number of operators during the previous downturn in 2015-2017,” the research firm said.

“Over the near term, we see a number of FPSO projects due to be awarded soon including Eni’s deep-water Agogo project in Angola and Total Energies’ Cameia project in Angola and Suriname project in Maka.

“Yinson Holdings Bhd recently became the sole qualified bidder for the Agogo project and is expected to receive a contract award by the end of 2022.”

Meanwhile, AmInvestment Bank gathered that Bumi Armada Bhd and MISC Bhd are among active contenders for the upcoming Cameia project in Angola which is likely to entail only engineering, procurement, construction, installation and commissioning packages.

“On the other hand, the outlook for other subsectors such as drilling rigs and offshore support vessels (OSVs) was relatively dull despite better industry prospects.

“In the second quarter of financial year 2022 (2QFY22), daily charter rates for Velesto Energy Bhd’s (Velesto Energy) jack-up rigs rose by 10 per cent to US$75,000 per day compared to US$68,000 per day in FY21 while rig utilisation rate dropped to 41 per cent from 48 per cent in 2021 (significantly lower than Southeast Asia jack-up rig utilisation rate of above 80 per cent) due to lower drilling activities in Malaysia.