KEY POINTS:
NZ Oil and Gas has raised nearly $180 million through the takeup of options by its shareholders, which is likely to boost the oil explorer into the top-20 largest listed companies.
About 84 per cent, or nearly 118 million, of the 139 million options have been taken up, and more applications have yet to be processed. The final figure should be known next week, said NZOG spokesman Chris Roberts.
Over 114m options were allotted today, at $1.50 each.
"With the share price where it is, about $1.86 today, clearly it's in the option-holder's interest to exercise. We were expecting a reasonable uptake and it will be interesting to see where the final number sits," Roberts said.
Once all options are exercised, the company should be comfortably among the 20 largest stocks in the top-50 index, he said. It was 34th at the end of last year.
NZOG had no more capital raisings planned, and had made no decisions yet on what the money will be used for.
"We have been actively, for the last six to nine months, been looking for new investment opportunities, and this successful options exercise simply raises the level of opportunity that we can go after," Roberts said.
The company said in April that raising more than $100m could force it to look overseas in terms of the scale of opportunities needed.
With oil at record highs, NZOG's forecast annual revenue is around $200m compared with total revenue two years ago of just $7.5m, largely due to its 12.5 per cent stake in Tui which began production nearly a year ago.
NZOG has other drilling permits in the Taranaki basin, a 15-per cent stake in the Kupe Project, and is 31-per cent owner of Pike River Coal.
NZOG shares hit a record high today of $1.87.
- NZPA
