Danville, CA, Tuesday, June 26, 2018 – PEDEVCO Corp. d/b/a Pacific Energy Development (NYSE American: PED) (the Company") reported today that it entered into a series of transactions resulting in the satisfaction and retirement of substantially all of its existing debt, successfully erasing over $75 million in debt and replacing it with $7.7 million in three-year 8% senior note funded by a strategic investor, SK Energy LLC. With these transactions, the Company estimates that it has increased its stockholders' equity by over $64 million.
With the Company’s balance sheet restructured, the Company believes it is now well-positioned to execute upon its business plan of developing its current assets, which include over $51 million in proved undeveloped reserves (PUDs) (undiscounted net present value) as most recently estimated by the Company’s independent reserve engineers and growing the Company through accretive acquisitions.
SK Energy LLC is wholly owned by Dr. Simon Kukes, a global energy businessman who has developed and ran multi-billion dollar energy companies around the world. His strategic leadership and vision has proven and delivered shareholder value globally for decades with such prominent companies as Phillips and Amoco, where he was in a leading technical position, and where he authored and obtained more than 130 patents, and also in a recent successful joint venture with Hess Corporation, and many other companies globally.
Mr. Frank Ingriselli, the Chairman, President & CEO of the Company, commented, "I personally committed to the Board and our shareholders publicly that we would use our best efforts and dedicate the Company to finding a strategic investor that would allow the Company to not only restructure its balance sheet and regain compliance with NYSE American listing standards, but that would be aligned with our strategy of accretively developing the Company’s existing assets and to also allow us to additionally focus on accretive acquisitions. We believe our new strategic investor, SK Energy, is the perfect partner to help us achieve all of these ends. Dr. Simon Kukes is a global strategic energy businessman who has successfully built multi-billion dollar enterprises and we believe his technical expertise, entrepreneurship and access to capital will put our Company on a path to deliver on its future plans to grow the Company and shareholder value.”
Dr. Simon Kukes, added, "I am excited to make this investment in PEDEVCO whose assets were only hindered in their development by its strangling debt situation. I believe the Company is now well-positioned to develop its assets, grow production, and seek accretive acquisitions. I hope to be able to assist the Company in those plans by working with them alongside American Resources Inc. (who assisted SK Energy in this transaction) to develop current assets, identify future opportunities and secure its capital needs."
