Bahamas Petroleum Company PLC (LON:BPC) has raised £9.5mln in an institutional share placing to boost the explorer’s funds ahead of the high impact Perseverance-1 well.
Some 475mln new shares are being issued to a range of institutional investors, priced at 2p each.
Perseverance-1 is a high-impact exploration well – high risk and high reward – targeting estimated potential resources in the range of 770mln to 1.4bn barrels.
READ: BPC confident of spudding Perseverance before Christmas
BPC said the equity raise is part of a drive to optimise its funding to achieve lower cost of capital, less aggregate dilution and greater certainty – due to the share placing BPC said it does not expect it will need to draw on an existing £16mln convertible bond facility.
Chief executive Simon Potter highlighted that the company has diligently implemented a funding strategy designed to ensure it will have access to the funds as and when needed.
“Today's placing is another milestone in the implementation of that funding strategy,” Potter said.
“The placing proceeds, being certain, immediately available and at a known dilution compared to other existing funding options, give us the opportunity to simplify the capital structure of the business whilst leaving us in a much stronger overall financial position.”
Potter added: “At the same time, with a view to continually seeking to strategically enhance the overall financial and operating capacity of the company, we continue to consider a wide range of other funding options.
“Many of these are newly available to us consequent on the broadening of our asset base in recent months.”