Bahamas Petroleum hires rig to drill by end of 2020
Bahamas Petroleum has hired a rig to start drilling at its well by the end of 2020 after the company was forced to delay its plans by the Covid-19 pandemic.
The AIM-traded company said it hired the rig from Stena Drilling for use at the site off the coast of the Bahamas between 15 December and 1 February at the Perseverance #1 site. Bahamas delayed the timing in March as the coronavirus pandemic spread.
The company's shares rose 14.6% to 3.39p at 12:44 BST.
Bahamas also said it had a substantially debt-free balance sheet after an investor converted its remaining £1.535m of convertible notes into equity at a conversion price of 1.27p a share. The company reported a pretax loss of $4.6m (£3.7m), more than three times the $1.3m loss a year earlier, as employee and finance costs rose.
Simon Potter, Bahamas' chief executive, said: "We have rescheduled our program, revisited our funding strategy, and most recently unconditionally contracted a drilling rig with a window for commencement of drilling beginning before the end of 2020. Shareholders should be equally encouraged by the relatively strong financial position we are in as we look forward to drilling operations at the end of 2020."