What you get when you hire us.

Counterparty Review

Before you sign, know who actually holds the interest rather than who signed the term sheet. We trace title and control back to source: the registered holder or the participating interests under the joint operating agreement, the chain of control above them, operatorship and how it can move, carried interests and state or national oil company back-in rights, charges and pledges over the interest, competing claims — and what that group has done with licences before. Every source is named, so the answer can go straight into a credit paper.

• Registered holder
• Participating interests under the JOA
• Chain of control
• Operatorship and how it can change
• Carried interests
• State or national oil company back-in rights
• Charges and pledges
• Competing claims
• Prior licence conduct

Tenure Risk Rating

A graded assessment of how exposed one licence is to a change in the terms it depends on. In mining that is renewal, revision, reassessment or withdrawal. In petroleum it is extension of the exploration period, approval of a development plan, relinquishment obligations, consent to a change of control, and revision of cost recovery, profit-oil or state participation terms. We show the factors and the reasoning, so you can argue with it rather than take it on faith. We do not forecast political events and we do not grade governments. We tell you which licences carry the most exposure if the framework around them moves.

• Mining: renewal, revision, reassessment and withdrawal
• Petroleum: exploration-period extensions
• Development-plan approval
• Relinquishment obligations
• Change-of-control consent
• Cost recovery and profit oil
• State participation

Asset Assessment

The full review of a named asset, at fixed fee, across eight domains: tenure and contract standing; resource or reserve credibility, reported to the standard that governs it; operator capability, including how operatorship is held and how it can change; fiscal and regulatory exposure; community standing and surface access; route to market — concentrate and doré offtake, or lifting entitlements, gas sales, pipeline and processing access; capital structure and funding gap; and integrated bankability. It ends where it should end: this is what would have to be true for this asset to be financeable, and here is what is missing.

• Tenure and contract standing
• Resource or reserve credibility · JORC, NI 43-101, SAMREC or PRMS
• Operator capability and operatorship
• Fiscal and regulatory exposure
• Community standing and surface access
• Route to market · concentrate and doré offtake; lifting entitlements, gas sales, pipeline and processing access
• Capital structure and funding gap
• Integrated bankability

We identify the applicable reporting basis and distinguish current reporting from historical estimates, including whether compliance with the applicable requirements is established.

Portfolio Watch

Diligence describes the day it was written. The position lasts a decade. In between, licences get renewed or quietly don't, interests change hands, work and relinquishment obligations fall due, and the terms themselves move — and nobody is obliged to tell you. We watch what you hold and tell you what moved, what moved it, and whether it changes your position. We do not hold a verified change back, and when one is confirmed every affected client is told at the same time.

• Renewals
• Ownership changes
• Work obligations
• Relinquishment obligations
• Regulatory decisions
• Changes to governing terms

Dispute Support

When a position has already been impaired. We retrieve the primary record, build the chronology, and give expert evidence on a question that is often decisive: whether the treatment of this licence was consistent with how the framework was applied to comparable ones.

• Primary legal and registry record
• Contemporaneous event chronology
• Comparable licence treatment
• Framework application
• Expert evidence