RE:Statoil
Statoil has very little incentive to complete the deal on the original terms. They can claim the
coup attempt as a sort of "force majeure" event, which has introduced uncertainty into the
situation, and they'd be completely justified in so doing. They would not be justified in citing
the poor results at Y-1 and BG-2 as reasons for backing out, but, privately, those have to be
considerations.
So why haven't we heard anything? If Statoil did back out, they might have said to VLE, "this is
much more important to you than it is to us, so you issue the PR", and VLE just hasn't gotten
around to it, yet.
A second possibility is that they haven't backed out, have no intention of backing out, but are
waiting on the decimated Turkish bureaucracy for some assurance that the JV will be
approved.
The third possibility is that they are still interested in the JV, but have decided to play hardball
with VLE to get better terms.
Take your pick....