Malaysian oil and gas player Perdana Petroleum is planning to raise up to MYR650m ($155.4m) for its operations through an Islamic bond, local reports said.

The five-year sukuk murabahah programme has been assigned a preliminary rating of AAA(fg)/stable by local rating agency RAM Rating Services.

RAM said Perdana Petroleum’s stand-alone credit strength reflected its synergies with its parent Dayang Enterprise Holdings coupled with time-charter contracts providing steady contributions.

RAM’s head of consumer and industrial ratings Kevin Lim said: “Dayang’s acquisition of the group is a strategic long-term move for the former in view of its intention to own a larger fleet to execute various hook-up and commissioning and maintenance jobs, given its order book of MYR3.98bn running up to mid-2018.”

Accordingly, Dayang has pledged to take up four more vessels on a call-out basis from next year (four vessels on time charters currently), essentially chartering half of Perdana Petroleum’s vessel fleet and contributing about 40% of its top line moving forward.