Ron Bain: Yes. I mean, Jim, it’s Ron. As we said before, the business itself is operating about 4,500 barrels equivalent to us per day when we close. And we see that is effectively going to be able to reduce the overall cash payment that we take because the effective date is the 1 October, 2023. So we’re looking at this deal as being, as I say, it’s going to close somewhere between $30 million and $40 million in cash. And with that business still continuing to deliver on those barrels right through until 2025, we see that business effectively paying itself back at present oil prices very, very quickly.
Jamie Wilen: Wonderful. At the end of the third quarter, you talked about kind of building cash in the fourth quarter of about $50 million. And I realize you had the buyback program, the dividend and your payables actually declined by $20 million. So it looks like you hit that $50 million target less all those outflows for shareholder returns and payable decline?
Ron Bain: That’s correct, Jamie. I mean our cash flow from operations was over $51 million for the quarter. And we did guide that in the transcript, we did state that because the drilling programs were over, and there’s a lag between that and the invoices being processed, they would have an account people outflow, and we did see that in Q4.
Jamie Wilen: Got you. I’m very pleased to see the acquisition was done for cash as opposed to shares considering how undervalued our shares are. As you look at the buyback program, we’re coming up on the — nearing the end of the $30 million, would you expect to reauthorize an additional sum for the buyback given the accretiveness of the acquisition and how good the operations have been over the past year and the future outlook?
George Maxwell: I mean that’s a good question. As I said earlier, the capital allocation is a key consideration that we’re going to address the upcoming meetings once we’ve completed and fully understand the program inside the Svenska acquisition. As I’ve said, we haven’t had direct discussions with the operator. So until we have that opportunity to sit down and fully understand those plans, then it allows us to give the longer-term cash management plan as to how we allocate that and make sure we — despite our very strong balance sheet to make sure we avoid going into a debt position. Not that debt is a bad thing when you’re looking at these kind of growth opportunities we have, but we’ll be planning to steer away from that.
Jamie Wilen: Excellent. As you talk about the closing of the acquisition in the second quarter, are you looking at the end of the second quarter? Or that’s a 90-day period? Where would you forecast it to be middle, beginning or end of the quarter?
George Maxwell: Thor and I are traveling to Cote d’Ivoire in two weeks’ time. And based on the reception we get from the minister, I’ll be able to answer that. But so far, the ministerial comments have been very positive on VAALCO entering the country.
Operator: The next question is a follow-up from Jeff Robertson of Water Tower Research.
Jeff Robertson: Just geopolitical question. Can you comment on any impacts that your Egypt operations are having moving export cargoes? Given what’s going on in the Red Sea and then you’ve operated with the new government of Gabon now for five or six months. Just a comment on how things are going with them.
George Maxwell: On the first instance, with regard to cargoes on the Red Sea, we’re seeing no impact on that, primarily because we’re still working with the EGPC to plan our 2024 cargoes, and we’re hopeful to get those discussions resolved in the very near future. So I guess from the shipping incidences that are taking place in the Red Sea, there’s absolutely no impact to us whatsoever. But the impact is we still have discussions right now with EGPC regarding our 2024 cargoes. And as we have our Q1 call in May, hopefully, we’re in a position to give a resolution to that with some timing for these cargoes. With regard to Gabon, I had a very good meeting with the President back in November and the minister when I traveled down to Libreville, had a really good private dinner with the President and understood his aspirations for the country and how we can work with them to achieve that.
We have seen some changes in regulatory framework in Gabon, which we’re going to have to work with, in particular, new financer, which has added 5% to the withholding tax, and we need to work out with the government how best and efficiently our investment is not impacted by that when we look at the drilling program. But overall, I think we have seen, as I mentioned last year, during the announcement of the Q, we have seen no impact to our operations, and I can attest to the meeting we had in November with the President, we see no impact to our future investing opportunities in Gabon. We have seen, as I mentioned earlier, that where we’ve had stalled discussions around blocks G and H with our partners, BWE and Panoro, we’ve seen an acceleration of those discussions in Q4 and Q1.
And hopefully, by the end of Q2, we’ve got some more exciting news on those opportunities.
Operator: This concludes our question-and-answer session. I would like to turn the conference back over to George Maxwell for any closing remarks.
