NEXUS Energy has exercised an option to sell a $75 million stake in the Crux gas and liquids field in Western Australia's offshore Browse Basin to the field's operator, Royal Dutch/Shell.
The move will drop Nexus's stake in Crux from 17 per cent to 15 per cent and boost Shell's stake to 82 per cent.
The Crux partners, who also include Osaka gas, are investigating a stand-alone floating LNG plant to develop the field following a July deal to merge the rights to the field's liquids, which Nexus owned, and the gas rights, which were Shell's.
The joint venture is in talks with the federal and WA governments over the terms of a retention licence for the field. It has proposed the terms of this lease include investigation of a stand-alone FLNG plant, rather than saving the gas at Crux for when reserves run low at Shell's world-first $US12 billion ($11.4bn) Prelude FLNG project, which is now being built.
"There are a number of additional funding sources available to the company, including restructuring of existing debt facilities, operating cashflows generated by Longtom and the sell-down of a further interest in Crux," Mr Della Martina said.
"We are positioned to manage our near-term obligations while maintaining a solid financial platform from which to operate and grow the business."
At the company's annual general meeting last month, Mr Della Martina said Nexus had received interest in both full and partial selldowns of its Crux stake -- which will be worth $563m after the option is exercised.
Yesterday, Nexus shares rose 1c to 15c.
Separately, Southern Cross Electrical Engineering yesterday said it had formed an LNG-focused joint venture with Irish electrical and instrumentation contractor Kentech.
