The London corporate team at Cobbetts LLP has advised on the Equatorial Palm Oil (EPO) placing and admission to AIM with a market capitalisation of £14.3m.

Cobbetts was instructed by Shore Capital and Mirabaud in their respective capacities as EPO’s nominated adviser and broker.

Newly-listed EPO joins the market after raising £6.5m through a placing of new ordinary shares allowing the group to advance its plans to become a major producer of sustainable low cost crude palm oil.

EPO’s current focus is on 169,000 hectares of land that it controls in Liberia, where it aims to develop sustainable palm oil plantations and a crude palm oil processing operation.

In the short-term, it will upgrade existing plantations to provide early cashflow and develop new plantations on previously logged land. Long-term, it is aiming to produce up to 500,000 tonnes a year to satisfy the demand for palm oil from Africa, India, China, and the US.