Bombed-out energy hopeful Caspian Holdings has paid £200,000 for half of Black Gold of Kentucky and raised £285,000 at 3p a share.

The London-based company, which is already involved in another US project at Pine Meadows and one at Zhengeldy in Kazakhstan, says Black Gold is a new company, focusing on ‘fast-track development of oil fields’. Black Gold’s initial project is the Irvine oil field in Kentucky, containing some 1,000 wells put into production by major oil companies in the 1930s and 1940s but later abandoned as uneconomic.

AIM-quoted Caspian, steered by chief executive Michael Masterman, argues that, with oil trading at more than $140 a barrel, they are once more commercially viable. He suggests that all three fields – Zhengeldy, Pine Meadows and Black Gold – could be ‘in production within six months’.

Shares in Caspian, which was floated four years ago at 23p, broke through 45p the following year, before later collapsing. Now 2.5p, they value the company at £2.3 million.

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Caspian Holdings	AIM	£0.67m	0.62p	0.00p
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