Submit a licenceLicence risk across African mining, oil and gas
Extractive Insight helps investors, lenders and insurers answer those questions about a specific licence. We establish what you are backing, how exposed its terms are to change, and what moves while you hold the position.
Why the individual licence matters
By licence we mean the instrument the asset depends on: a mining licence, an exploration or production block, a production sharing contract or a concession. Its value rests on the rights granted or agreed, and on how they are administered.
A mine can have a flawless orebody, a competent operator and a signed offtake, and still lose its economics because a permit went unrenewed, a fiscal term was revised, or a code reform removed a stability guarantee.
A commercial petroleum discovery can lose its value if the exploration period is not extended, the development plan is not approved, acreage must be relinquished, or cost recovery and profit-oil terms are reopened after capital has been committed.
The exposure sits in the particular licence and contract: its renewal conditions, its stability clause, its work obligations and the decisions already taken under them.
Two licences under the same framework can be affected completely differently.
States revise the terms on which their resources are developed. What matters commercially is how those changes affect the licence you hold. A country score cannot establish that exposure.
Experienced underwriters and credit officers already differentiate between licences. We give that judgment a documented basis: a graded assessment whose factors, reasoning and sources can be examined and compared across a portfolio.
We work at the level of the individual licence. That is the whole discipline of the firm.
What you get when you hire us
Before you sign, know who holds the interest and who controls it. We trace title, participating interests under the joint operating agreement, operatorship and back-in rights to named sources you can use in a credit paper.
Read about Counterparty ReviewUnderstand how exposed a licence is if its governing terms change. We show the factors and the reasoning, so you can argue with the assessment rather than take it on faith.
Read about Tenure Risk RatingFind out what would have to be true for an asset to be financeable, and what is missing. Our fixed-fee review connects the resource, its reporting basis, the operator, the governing terms and the route to market.
Read about Asset AssessmentDiligence describes the day it was written. The position lasts a decade. In between, interests and terms can change, and nobody is obliged to tell you. We watch what you hold and explain what each verified change means for your position. We agree the watchlist at the outset: the licences covered and the review interval. You receive a written note on each verified change and what it means for your position.
Read about Portfolio WatchWhen a position has been impaired, the decisive question may be how comparable licences were treated. We retrieve the primary record, build the chronology and give expert evidence on whether the framework was applied consistently.
Read about Dispute SupportThe evidence behind the work
Locus / The platform we are building
Every assessment we produce rests on a maintained record of the licence: its identity, its ownership and participating interests, and the events that changed it. Each entry carries its source and source tier.
Every record carries two dates: when the event occurred, and when it became known to us. That is what allows a decision to be revisited against the information that was actually available when it was made.
We are building that record into Locus, a platform covering African mining, oil and gas licences. Locus is designed for subscription access and will open to clients in stages as coverage builds. Today it supports our own work.
Open publication
Why you can trust the answer
We assess assets. We do not rank countries, and we do not publish views on governments.
01Licence holders, operators and their controlling affiliates cannot commission, pay for, or receive advance sight of our assessment of their own assets.
02When ratings are published to subscribers, every subscriber entitled to a rating will receive it at the same moment, including subscribers holding an interest in the asset. There will be no early version and no private version.
03We take no contingent or success-based fees and no paid government mandate anywhere within our coverage.
Those rules cost us revenue. They are the reason the answer is worth buying.
Enquiries
Tell us the named asset and the decision in front of you. We will confirm whether it is within coverage before we quote.
Submit a licence