BPZ Energy negotiates $19.5 million PIPE; Syntax-Brillian pockets $10 million from stock offering

By Sheri Kasprzak

New York, Dec. 4 - Volume picked back up as the PIPE market got back down to business Monday, with oil prices slipping and stocks making a comeback.

"I would say [volume was] set back last week because of oil and stocks," said one sellsider when asked about the impact of those two factors on private placements. "There's no lack of interest [in PIPEs]. Investors still seem interested."

Oil prices took a dive on Monday, giving up 98 cents to end the day at $62.45 per barrel. Meanwhile, stocks came back with the Dow Jones Industrial Average climbing 89.72 to close at 12,283.85 and the Nasdaq composite index gaining 35.18 to end at 2,448.39. The Standard & Poor's 500 composite index settled up 12.41 at 1,409.12.

BPZ plans offering

And speaking of oil, BPZ Energy, Inc. priced a $19.5 million stock offering as part of a $120 million financing with International Finance Corp. and other financial institutions.

The stock deal includes 6.5 million shares at $3.00 each funded by IFC, a private sector arm of the World Bank Group. The deal will make IFC BPZ's majority shareholder.

The company's chief executive officer Manuel Zuniga Pflucker could not be reached Monday for comment on the offering.

On Monday, the stock remained unchanged at $4.20 (Pink Sheets: BPZI).

The financing agreement between BPZ and IFC includes up to $50 million from IFC's own account, including the private placement. The rest of the $70 million will be funded by commercial banks and other financial institutions.

Proceeds from the deal will allow BPZ to complete its gas-to-power project in the Corvina Gas Field offshore northwest Peru.

The company has conducted private placement financings in the past. In July, the company's sold 4.482 million shares at $2.75 each for $12,325,500 in proceeds. The price per share was a 31.2% discount to the company's $4.00 closing stock price on June 30.

BPZ, based in Houston, is an oil and natural gas exploration and production company focused on properties in northwest Peru and southwest Ecuador.

Syntax-Brillian raises $10 million

Moving to the tech sector, Syntax-Brillian Corp. completed a stock offering with the chiefs of two of its vendors for $10 million.

The company sold 1,293,661 shares at $7.73 each to John Jung-Jyh Wu, chief executive officer of TCV Group, and John Huang, chairman of Premier Image Technology Corp.

TCV supplies plastic-injection molded parts for Syntax-Brillian and Premier Image is the contract manufacturer of Syntax-Brillian's brand of digital cameras.

The investors received warrants for 64,683 shares, exercisable at $9.276 each for three years. The warrants become exercisable on June 1, 2007.

The offering was announced late Monday and the company's stock gave up 5 cents on the day to close at $8.56, but gained 50 cents, or 5.84%, in after-hours trading (Nasdaq: BRLC).

"We're impressed with Syntax-Brillian's rapid ascent in the North American HDTV market and its potential to continue to capture market share into the future," said Wu in a statement. "We look forward to working closely, as a partner, with Syntax-Brillian to support its volume requirements as it builds recognition of the Olevia brand for HDTV excellence."

"Our new strategic alignment with Syntax-Brillian invigorates our support of the Vivitar digital camera line, as well as the development of a new generation of LcoS microdisplay-related products for the consumer electronics marketplace," said Huang in a news release.

Tempe, Ariz.-based Syntax-Brillian manufactures high-definition television and digital entertainment products.

ReGen closes $6.95 million deal

Over in the biotech sector, ReGen Biologics, Inc. watched its stock soar after settling a $6.956 million private placement. The stock gained 21.05% on the day after the closing was announced Monday morning.

The stock began its ascent early in the day, gaining 10.53% by 9:30 a.m. ET. The stock ended up 8 cents to close at $0.46 (OTCBB: RGBI).

Volume was low early in the session with 35,250 shares traded at 9:30 a.m. ET compared with the average 86,776 shares. At the end of the day, however, volume was higher than average with 244,550 shares traded compared with the average 86,776 shares.

In the placement, ReGen sold 18.8 million shares at $0.37 apiece to investors in the U.S. and Europe. The price per share was only a slight discount to the company's $0.38 closing stock price Friday.

The investors received warrants for 5.64 million shares, exercisable at $0.55 each for five years.

The investors also have the option to purchase the same number of shares they purchased in the offering at the same price within 15 days of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration clearance of the company's collagen scaffold device.

Headquartered in Franklin Lakes, N.J., ReGen develops orthopedic products used for tissue growth and repair.

Metallica plans unit deal

North of the border, Metallica Resources Inc. negotiated a C$30.015 million private placement.

The offering includes 6.67 million units of one share and one half-share warrant at C$4.50 each.

Each whole warrant exercisable at C$5.50 for three years.

Underwriter Canaccord Capital Corp. has a greenshoe for up to 1,000,500 additional units, exercisable up to 30 days after closing.

Metallica's stock gave up 3%, or 14 cents, on Monday to close at C$4.55 (Toronto: MR). Volume was up with 1,415,825 shares traded compared with the average 229,722 shares.

The deal is set to close on Dec. 20.

Proceeds will be used for work at the company's Cerro San Pedro gold project, as well as for exploration and working capital.

Toronto-based Metallica is a precious and base metal exploration and development company.

In other resources offerings, Tahera Diamond Corp. sealed a private placement of units for C$30 million.

The company sold 30 million units of one share and three series of warrants for 7,369,919 shares each for a total of 22,109,757 shares to Teck Cominco Ltd. as part of a strategic alliance between the two companies.

Each series A warrant is exercisable at C$1.20 through Nov. 30, 2007; each series B warrant is exercisable at C$1.35 through Nov. 30, 2008; and series C at C$1.50 through Nov. 30, 2009.

Teck Cominco now holds 16% of Tahera's outstanding common shares.

Proceeds will be used for exploration and production on the company's Jericho Diamond Mine. The rest will be used for working capital.

The stock gave up a penny on Monday to close at C$1.22 (Toronto: TAH).

Based in Toronto, Tahera is a diamond exploration company.

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