Forte Oil to raise N50bn debt capital before December
Forte Oil Plc has expressed its readiness to raise fresh capital of N50 billion before the end of the year for operations expansion.

Group Chief Executive Officer of Forte Oil, Mr. Akin Akinfemiwa revealed this on Monday during the ‘Facts Behind the Figures’ presentation of the company on the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE).

Akinfemiwa said the company is discussing with regulators in the capital market for the approval of N50 billion debt capital before the end of 2016.

In clarity, Akinfemiwa stated that the company only concentrate on debt instrument saying, there is no intension to raise equity fund for now.

“We will be raising debt capital in 2016 and we are in discussion with NSE but for equity fund raising, it will not happen this year maybe in the future.”

He added that “We want to raise long term debts and make our interest rate very predictive. The first series of the fund will be between N10 and N15 billion.”

Speaking on the company’s half year result for the period ended June 30, 2016, he pointed out that in H1 2016, Forte Oil maintained its 14 per cent market share among the major marketers in the white products segment of the downstream sector as a result of ongoing strategic retail network expansion and growth of our commercial and lubricants customer Base despite market difficulties.

“The company recorded 47 per cent in revenue, 99 per cent increase in gross margin, 69 per cent increase in profit before tax and 90 per cent increase in profit after tax while total asset grew by 14 per cent in half year, 2016 as against half year, 2015.

“The business was also able to activate an additional 40 new sales points for its lubricants as we continue to focus on the higher margin products,” he said.

According to the GCEO, we have resumed operation of our LPG sales having achieved 100 per cent completion stage on the repairs of the LPG storage assets as this will ensure constant product availability.

He added that major overhaul of the Geregu power plant at a cost of $83 million awarded to the OEM Messrs, while Simens AG is nearing completion with third and final unit being worked on, saying facility’s output now at 435MW from the 414MW upon hand over in 2013.
He stated that Forte Oil has entered strategic partnership and alliances with technical partners to strategically position for the proposed federal government sale of marginal oil fields and divestment of international oil companies investments in local oil blocks.

He however assured shareholders of the company that the second half will be much better than the first half of the year, saying the company will continue to focus on high margin products, fully exploit LPG business and expand the Geregu power plant asset.