(BTC) Baltic Oil Terminals

Baltic Oil Terminals PLC

AGM Statement

At the AGM to be held at 1100 hours today, Richard Healey Non Executive Chairman and Simon Escott CEO will give the following update.

Despite the problems caused by the delay in the 2010 Audit process, we are pleased to announce that considerable progress has been achieved in the last few months and the Group's operations are trading profitably.

Petro Broker International BV (PBI) has been fully integrated into the Group and the cost savings which commenced in early 2011 have now flowed through to the bottom line. All tanks are fully let and it is expected that the increase in the cost of Fuel Oil and Bunker Fuel seen over the last month will have a positive effect on rates for 2012.

Haahr Tank-Lager A/S in Albenraa Denmark, a 160,000 cubic meter terminal was acquired in November 2011. The terminal has been re-named Dan-Balt Tank Lager A/S ("Dan-Balt").  As announced, it will take at least six months to integrate the terminal into the Group and work has already commenced on this. However the terminal is already profitable, and with the switch from storage to transhipment operations we are confident that Dan-Balt will become an important profit centre for Baltic by Q3 2012.

The Group now has over 280,000 cubic meters of tank storage under management and/or ownership, outside of Russia.

The Group's operations have stabilised in Kaliningrad to a great extent. Management believes that it is close to a resolution of any remaining issues in relation to Rosbunker and it is also addressing the problems that adversely affected the audit for 2010.

We are pleased to announce two imminent appointments, designed to strengthen the Board and the Management team.

Adrian Simpson, presently CFO, will become Financial Director and join Simon Escott, Richard Healey and Louis Castro on the Board. Adrian is an FCA and has extensive experience in Accountancy and Financial Management having trained with Spicer and Pegler and worked with Coopers and Lybrand and Deloitte subsequently. Adrian was a Partner with Mazars for 15 years where he managed a portfolio of clients in several different industries.

Martin Napa, presently working as a consultant, will join the management team as Director of Operations. Martin is Estonian and speaks fluently four languages including Russian. Martin will work out of our Rotterdam office and will report directly to Simon Escott. He has ten years' experience in hydro carbons and logistics and will be of great value in the integration and maximisation of Dan-Balt in particular.

In summary, the Group enters 2012, with a greatly reduced risk profile than at the start of 2011, having coped with and resolved serious issues that were both a drain on management time and also had a detrimental effect on progress of both of our Russian operations. The emphasis of the Company is to be better balanced by having operations and assets both inside and outside Russia, no longer reliant on a single locality and with the emphasis of growing an integrated, independent transhipment chain in Europe.  The Board expects 2012 to be a year of significant progress.

 Enquiries:

A further announcement will be made in relation to Adrian Simpson once his appointment to the Board is effective, disclosing any additional information required by the AIM Rules.