Shares up 34% for well explorer

AMINEX plc, an Irish oil and gas explorer saw the sharpest rise in its share price in four years in London yesterday, after tests at the Sunny Ernst-2 well in Texas “materially exceeded expectations”, the company said.

Aminex currently has operations in Africa and the US.

Its shares gained as much as 3p or 34% to 11.75p following yesterday’s announcement, the steepest one-day advance since September 2004.

The stock has fallen 56% this year, giving the company a market value of £35.8 million (€45.3m).

The well is “expected to transform Aminex’s existing US production and to make a material and immediate contribution to cashflow,” the Dublin based company said.

The well in Galveston County, Texas, was found to have multiple hydrocarbon-bearing formations in four separate zones which have now been logged as possible reservoirs.

Aminex has a 37.5% working interest in the well which has encountered multiple hydrocarbon-bearing formations in four separate zones, all of which have been logged as potential reservoirs, the company said.

“The well is expected to transform Aminex’s existing US production and to make a material and immediate contribution to cashflow,” it said.

On 21 August Aminex said the well at its Alta Loma permit in Galveston County, had uncovered a number of potential gas bearing sites.