History
A shell company that became Viking, built Kansas and Gulf Coast oil assets on heavy debt, sold them off, and was absorbed by Camber Energy in 2023.
2005-2008: A shell changes hands
The record for the company's early years is thin. In March 2005 it deregistered its securities, ending its duty to file reports with the SEC. In August 2005 a dispute over the poker.com domain and trademark was settled: Communication Services Inc. paid $435,000 into trust to settle with LegalPlay and Uninet, and LegalPlay received $42,000 cash plus 250,000 of its own shares back.
The Viking story began in 2008, when the company was named Synthenol. On August 15, 2008, Viking Investments Group LLC bought 366,520 shares, about 50.1%, for $350,000 and took over $243,500 of the company's debts. Tom Simeo and Richard Xu replaced the old directors, Cecil Morris and John Page. In September, Viking Investments received 284,637 more shares in exchange for releasing $270,405 of debt it held. This is the origin of the Viking name. The record then goes quiet until 2014.
2014-2017: First oil and gas in Canada and Kansas
In November 2014 the company entered oil and gas in earnest, paying Tanager Energy Inc. about $302,000 for a 50% working interest in the Joffre oil property in Alberta, Canada.
Kansas followed. In March 2016 it closed on working interests in four Miami and Franklin County leases, producing about 30 barrels a day, for $1,305,000 cash, a $45,000 note and 4,500,000 shares. In October 2016, through its subsidiary Mid-Con Petroleum, it opened a revolving credit line of up to $3 million with CrossFirst Bank, raised $610,000 in notes-and-shares units, and bought more Kansas leases (about 660 acres, roughly 40 barrels a day) for $1,105,858 plus 5,152,021 shares. Shares on issue grew from 30.3 million at the end of 2015 to 53.1 million at the end of 2016.
The same month brought a setback: auditor Green & Company resigned and said its 2015 audit and two 2016 quarterly reports should not be relied on, citing share issuances to a consultant. Viking disputed this and hired Mohle Adams to re-audit 2015. Further auditor changes were reported in mid-November 2016.
2017-2020: The Gulf Coast buildout
In November 2017 Viking agreed to buy interests from Black Rhino, LP, a deal that grew into the acquisition of Petrodome Energy, LLC. It closed on December 29, 2017, giving Viking its first Texas and Louisiana production, financed by an $8.5 million term loan from 405 Petrodome LLC and Cargill Inc. In January 2018 it agreed to buy 41 more Kansas leases from Woodway Oil & Gas KS I, LLC for $2.2 million. In June 2018 it replaced separate facilities with a single $30 million CrossFirst Bank revolving line, with $12.4 million drawn initially.
The largest deal came at the end of 2018: the roughly $86 million Ichor acquisition of Texas and Louisiana producing properties, financed by a $63.6 million term loan from ABC Funding, LLC at 10-12% interest. Shares on issue stood at 72.3 million at the end of 2017, 91.0 million at the end of 2018 and 13.8 million at the end of 2019. The beats do not explain these changes.
In October 2019 Viking's subsidiary Elysium Energy, LLC agreed to buy a second Gulf Coast platform for $40 million. It closed on February 6, 2020, financed by a $36.5 million term loan from 405 Woodbine LLC.
2020-2023: Camber, retreat and merger
On February 5, 2020, Viking signed a merger agreement with Camber Energy, Inc., and Camber lent Viking $5,000,000 on a secured note. A second secured note of $4,200,000 followed in June 2020 alongside a third amendment to the merger agreement. In September the agreement was restated. In December 2020 it was terminated, and Camber instead bought a 51% stake in Viking (236,470,588 shares) for $10.9 million cash plus cancellation of $9.2 million in notes. In January 2021 Camber bought a further 145,384,615 shares by retiring $20.9 million Viking owed to EMC Capital Partners. A new merger agreement was signed in February 2021.
In July 2021 Camber, then about 62% owner, bought another 27.5 million shares for $11 million, taking its stake to about 73%. The money funded diversification: in August Viking closed a purchase of a 60.5% stake in Simson-Maxwell Ltd., a Canadian engine maker, for about CA$10 million, and licensed carbon-capture patents from ESG Clean Energy, LLC, paying $1.5 million up front.
Viking then retreated from its Gulf Coast oil business. It handed back Ichor in October 2021 and Elysium a week later. In November 2021 it agreed to buy New Rise Renewables, a renewable-diesel plant under construction in Reno, Nevada, fixing the price in December at $300 million ($25 million cash plus preferred stock). In July 2022 the Petrodome subsidiaries sold all their oil and gas interests in Louisiana, Texas and Mississippi, and the proceeds fully repaid the CrossFirst Bank line.
After about two years of dormancy, Viking and Camber announced in March 2023 that merger talks had resumed. A joint proxy filed on June 13, 2023 set stockholder votes for July 20, 2023, with each Viking common share to become one Camber common share. The merger closed on August 1, 2023. Every Viking share converted into Camber stock, trading in VKIN stopped, and Viking became a wholly owned Camber subsidiary and deregistered with the SEC.
Written from the 34 story beats below (2005 to 1 Aug 2023), which come from the company's own announcements and filings.