Oracle Coalfields announced yesterday that Generali Group had subscribed for more than 26.4 million placing shares, representing 6.79% of the enlarged issued share capital of Oracle.

The placing also includes the cash subscription by Oracle directors Adrian Loader and Anthony Scutt.

Oracle announced it had raised £775,000 ($A1.38 million) before expenses via the placing of 62 million new ordinary shares of 0.1 pence each in the company (placing shares) at a placing price of 1.25p per share.

Following the admission of the placing shares, Oracle's enlarged issued share capital will comprise 389,009,493 ordinary shares. The company does not hold any shares in treasury.

Oracle CEO Shahrukh Khan said a number of new investors participated in the placing, which represented the latest step towards the company’s goal of developing a producing mine capable of supplying indigenous coal to contribute towards alleviating Pakistan's growing energy crisis while simultaneously delivering long-term sustainable returns for our shareholder base.

Oracle’s primary interest is the Thar coalfield block VI licence area – a 1.4 billion tonne resource with 529 million tonnes JORC mineral resource and 113Mt JORC proven reserves within the mining area of the licence.

The project includes a $US1.5 billion ($A1.65 billion) thermal coal and power plant in the Sindh province and is in the process of securing funding from large Chinese groups and power offtake with K-Electric (formerly Karachi Electric Supply Company).

The block VI project is based on 5 million tonnes per annum of coal supplying the 600 megawatt mine-mouth power plant.