Urals Energy makes changes to Kamchatcomagroprombank financing

Russia-focused independent exploration and production company Urals Energy announced on Wednesday that, further to its announcement on 23 August, the loan provided by Kamchatcomagroprombank (KKAPB) for the acquisition of Arctic Oil Company has now been repaid in full.

The AIM-traded firm said following the repayment of the loan, the its subsidiary JSC Arcticneft entered into a new short-term loan finance arrangement with KKAPB.

The principal terms of the new KKAPB loan included a RUB 40m principal - approximately $0.66m, with a term expiry of 31 August 2017.

It carries an interest margin of 5% over central bank rate, equivalent to a total of 15% on an annualised basis, with part of the crude oil produced by Arcticneft as security.

The proceeds of the new KKAPB loan will be used by the group for the general working capital financing of Arcticneft, Urals Energy’s board said.

“Based on the data available from the central bank of the Russian Federation, the board believes that the terms of the new KKAPB loan compare favourably with potential terms from other Russian banks, as credit remains generally difficult to obtain in Russia,” it explained in a statement.

It also noted that KKAPB is a bank in which Mr Shvets, the shareholder of Adler SA - Urals Energy's largest shareholder - is a board member and shareholder with 15.4% of KKAPB's issued share capital.

“Additionally, the group is approaching the full repayment of the final tranche of one of its loan facilities with OJSC Sberbank of Russia, which was originally put in place in 2015.”

Following the full repayment of the 2015 Sberbank facility, the group said it will have a single revolving finance arrangement in place with Sberbank as originally announced on 20 September.