Gran Tierra reaffirms South America focus amid Canada foray

Calgary-based Gran Tierra will continue to prioritize South America's oil and gas sector despite its new foray in Canada, executives said on Monday. 

The company has been buoyed by a series of discoveries in Ecuador and remains optimistic in Colombia, despite the latter's challenging political panorama. 

"In 2025 we will be allocating capex to new discoveries in Ecuador, continued development of mature waterfloods in Colombia and interesting oil opportunities in Canada," CEO Gary Guidry told investors during a quarterly earnings call. 

Gran Tierra has set a 2024 capex guidance midpoint of US$225mn compared to realized capex of US$219mn last year. 

Guidry declined to say whether next year's figure would be higher, adding that the company would publish its 2025 guidance in early January. 

CFO Ryan Ellson said the firm was also working on a five-year business plan in which Ecuador was likely to feature prominently.

"We expect Ecuador to grow quite a bit," Ellson said. "I would still expect South America to make up the majority of adjusted Ebtida. Canada will evolve but we're not going to stop developing in Ecuador and Colombia. They are still core areas for us and we expect them to continue to grow."

Gran Tierra reported third quarter net income of US$1mn compared to US$36.4mn in the prior quarter and US$7mn a year earlier. 

Last week, the company completed its US$226mn acquisition of i3 Energy, which has a growing production base in the western Canadian sedimentary basin and appraisal assets in the North Sea.