Lansdowne Oil & Gas shelves sale process after raising £2.1m

Lansdowne Oil & Gas has shelved its formal sale process after announcing a new deal to raise £2.1m in capital against the backdrop of a "rising oil price environment that now seems to be taking hold".

The cash will be used to meet the company's share of a $7m settlement to oilfield services firm Transocean in a dispute over drilling costs dating back to 2012 and fund on-going working capital requirements until mid-2017, Lansdowne said in a statement.

It added that LC Capital Master Fund has agreed to convert £0.93m of debt in the form of a senior secured loan note issued in March 2015 into new shares and extend the term of other loan notes to 30 June 2017.

LC will hold 28.8% of Lansdowne after the conversion.

In May, Lansdowne said it needed to raise funds by issuing shares below their nominal value.

The dispute with Transocean involved Lansdowne and Providence Resources over a semi-submersible drilling unit in 2010 - 2011 to be used on the Barryroe field in the Celtic Sea. Providence holds an 80% stake in Barryroe and Lansdowne holds the remaining 20%.

Application has been made for the admission of 318.4m ordinary shares to trading on AIM and dealings are expected to commence on 22nd June 2016, Lansdowne said.

In a separate announcement, the company said it made a full year post-tax loss of £15.1m, including an impairment charge of £14.95m compared with a £1.32m loss in 2014.

Loss per share came in at 10.2 pence compared with a loss of 0.9p a share last time.