Papua New Guinea’s largest bank reportedly considers dual listing, ADB outlook for PNG ‘positive’, and Santos restructures. Your weekly digest of the latest business news.

Bank South Pacific Group Chairman, Sir Kostas Constantinou has described reports of the bank considering a possible secondary listing on the Australian Stock Exchange as ‘speculative’. Sir Kostas was responding to recent reports by The Australian that the bank was heading towards a secondary listing through investment bank UBS with a float expected to be worth A$1 billion.

He said in a statement, however, the bank is considering ‘a potential dual listing of BSP stock in a jurisdiction that is both appropriate in terms of achieving increased liquidity and effective in terms of governance standards and business rules that are fundamentally consistent with POMSOX’.

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The 2017 mid-term economic outlook for PNG remains positive, according to the Asian Development Bank Country Economist Yurendra Basnett, due to the mining projects and other investment projects expected to come online soon. He warned, however, of building inflationary pressures. ‘We expect an inflation to be at about 6.5 per cent. We expect the inflation to increase in 2017 to 7.5 per cent.’

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Santos’ Kevin Gallagher

Air Niugini is preparing to begin direct flights between Port Moresby and Townsville in late March, 2017, the Townsville Bulletin reports. It will be a twice-weekly service.

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Santos has outlined a new strategy to become ‘a low-cost, high performance business’. Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer Kevin Gallagher says Santos will focus on five core, long-life natural gas assets: Cooper Basin; GLNG; PNG; Northern Australia, and Western Australia Gas. The remaining assets will be packaged and run separately for value as a standalone business. It will also aim to reduce its debt by US$1.5 billion to less than US$3 billion by the end of 2019. Gallagher said during 2016 the company had reduced the ‘free cash flow breakeven oil price to US$39 per barrel, down from US$47 per barrel at the start of the year’.

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The world’s first project to mine the seabed for minerals is expected to begin operations in Papua New Guinea in early 2019, Adam Wright, vice-president of PNG operations for Nautilus, told the PNG Mining and Petroleum Investment Conference in Sydney. A big incentive for mining the seabed is the higher concentration, or grade, of the metal.

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China has agreed to spend nearly $US4 billion (K8 billion) to build a giant industrial park in West Sepik Province, reports RNZI.PNG’s Treasurer Patrick Pruaitch says the plans involve large-scale processing of timber products, fisheries, cassava and tropical spices at one park, while an adjacent park will cater for Shenzhen-based companies that want to produce steel, cement and other industrial products.

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The Parties to the Nauru Agreement (PNA) estimate 50,000 fish aggregating devices (FADs) in use in the western and central Pacific tuna fishery, many of which are equipped with increasingly sophisticated sonar and satellite technology linking FADs to fishing vessels.  A FAD is anything fish associate with, ranging from such things as logs, living or dead whales to a man-made raft.

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The WWF tuna program manager, Bubba Cook, says Japan could solve the crisis around Pacific bluefin tuna easily, by refusing to accept any more Pacific bluefin tuna. The Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission has called for a two-year moratorium on bluefin fishing. Stocks are now less than 3 per cent of their pre-commercial fishing levels. Japan currently takes 80 per cent of the bluefin catch.

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The new Koki fish market

The new K13 million Koki fish market facility was officially opened in Port Moresby this week. The project is a partnership between the National Fisheries Authority, National Capital District Commission, Puma Energy and PNG Forestry.

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The Japan International Co-operation Agency has completed the 50-year Lae-Nazab Urban Development Plan and has handed it over to the Morobe Provincial Government.

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The proposed Reserve Businesses and SME Bank legislations are bad for the sector, says the World Bank’s Simon Bell. He says the laws will affect the growth of SMEs.

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Tinah Kama with staff at Bill’s Tropical Eden. Credit: The National

Flower sellers want the National Capital District Commission to provide a specialist market in Port Moresby, says Tinah Kama of Bill’s Tropical Eden. She reportedly says more than 50 women are involved in the flower business in Port Moresby alone, and the sector is expanding. She currently operates at the PNG Women in Business trade centre in Waigani.

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US President-elect Donald Trump has confirmed the CEO of Exxon Mobil, Rex Tillerson, as his choice for US Secretary of State.

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And finally, World Vision in Solomon Islands reportedly says disaster preparedness was key in saving lives after the country was rattled by two powerful earthquakes. On Friday, a 7.8 tremor struck off Makiri Island, south-east of the capital Honiara, followed by a magnitude 7.0 on Saturday. Radio NZ says 7000 people across three provinces are reported to have been affected.