Afren Rises to Five-Month High After Nigerian Okoro Oil Find
January 17, 2012, 9:40 PM ESTBy Brian Swint and Eduard Gismatullin
(Updates with closing share price from first paragraph.)
Jan. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Afren Plc, the U.K. explorer focused on Africa and Iraqi Kurdistan, rose to a five-month high in London trading after saying it found oil and gas at the Okoro East exploration well off southeast Nigeria.
Afren climbed as much as 16 percent to the highest level since Aug. 3. It discovered 549 feet (167 meters) of so-called net oil pay and 41 feet of net gas pay in “excellent quality reservoir sands,” the London-based company said today in a statement. The well was drilled to a total depth of 8,751 feet.
“The well has successfully encountered oil in the Tertiary reservoir sands equivalent to those that have been developed and are in production at the Okoro main field,” the company said. “The discovery of significant pay in the previously unexplored deeper zones opens up further prospectivity at similar levels on the main Okoro field and elsewhere on the block.”
The shares advanced 13 percent to 130.5 pence at the 4:30 p.m. close in London, bringing the year’s gain to 52 percent.
--With assistance from Randall Hackley in Zurich. Editors: Tony Barrett, Will Kennedy
To contact the reporters on this story: Brian Swint in London at bswint@bloomberg.net; Eduard Gismatullin in London at egismatullin@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Will Kennedy at wkennedy3@bloomberg.net
