Discoveries boost Angola upstream mood

Prospects for a first licensing round in almost a decade will be buoyed by new finds

Angola will hold an auction of upstream exploration licenses in October—a first under the presidency of Joao Lourenco and a first in almost 10 years. A series of new oil discoveries by Italy's Eni should bring some much-needed feel-good factor. Angola is sub-Saharan Africa's second-largest oil producer, but output has dwindled as the crude price slump from mid-2014 made the country's relatively high cost deepwater reserves a less attractive prospect. Crude oil production fell to 1.42mn bl/d in June 2019 from 1.77mn bl/d in 2013, according to Opec data. "With the blocks that are in operation now, the geology is becoming more complex and the fields are more spread out, so you really need to th