Nigerian oil and gas company Heirs Energies secured a $750 million loan from the African Export-Import Bank, to boost investment into an oil field that has doubled in capacity in four years.
Heirs Energies is among a rising crop of indigenous firms looking to dominate the exploration landscape in Africa’s top oil-producing country and is part of a conglomerate owned by the Nigerian banking magnate Tony Elumelu. The company’s oil field in southern Nigeria is producing more than 50,000 barrels of oil per day this year, up from 25,000 bpd in 2021. The Afreximbank financing is targeted toward further increasing output, the company said.
In October, Heirs Energies’ Chief Financial Officer Sam Nwanze said the company was looking to raise money to finance plans to double output to 100,000 bpd within three to five years. Oil and gas fundraising in Africa was benefiting from “a shift from international lenders wanting to focus once again on upstream oil and gas financing,” thanks to the influence of Washington’s interest in reviving the sector, Nwanze told Semafor.
