Petrofac’s aim, in updating the market just before the end of the first half of its financial year, was to reassure that the Serious Fraud Office investigation announced a month ago was not, as feared, leading to a loss of new contract wins as nervous clients left the company off tender lists.
The reassurance only partly succeeded. There is not a lot that the company can say about the SFO inquiry into its links with Unaoil, which it has employed in Kazakhstan in the past, amid allegations of bribery and money laundering, and it could drag on for a while. Other UK oil service companes have also been dragged into the affair.
Unfortunately, Petrofac was required to accompany that reassurance over the pipeline of