This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily on March 19, 2019

KUALA LUMPUR: Barakah Offshore Petroleum Bhd, which has been granted a 90-day extension for its restraining order from the High Court, said yesterday the amount of debt that it needs to restructure is not known yet.

“The board of directors of Barakah wishes to clarify that the company is still in the midst of formulating a debt restructuring scheme to settle the group’s debt.

“At this juncture, the actual amount of debt to be restructured has yet to be determined,” Barakah said in a filing yesterday.

The oil and gas firm said its total borrowings (inclusive of its subsidiaries) were at RM335.6 million as at end-2018. Based on its balance sheet as at Dec 31, 2018, its long-term liabilities were at RM172.02 million and trade payables were at RM139.69 million.

Barakah’s filing was in response to an article in The Edge Malaysia weekly for the week of March 18-24, 2019.

It reported that Barakah, alongside its two main subsidiaries — PBJV Group Sdn Bhd and Kota Laksamana 101 Ltd — is seeking to restructure RM726.53 million in debt, quoting sources.

A chunk of Barakah’s liabilities are off-balance sheet transactions, hence they are not shown in its books. It is also worth noting that the company has changed its financial year end from Dec 31 to June 30.

The filing with Bursa highlighted that Barakah and its wholly-owned subsidiary PBJV Group had obtained a restraining order from the High Court for an extension of another 90 days from Jan 14, 2019. However, contingent creditors are excluded from the restraining order.

The Edge Malaysia weekly reported that financial institutions with exposure to Barakah are Export-Import Bank of Malaysia, SME Bank and several major local commercial banks.