The company will issue Blackrock with 40 million fully paid ordinary shares in Cokal at a price of 50c per share.

The placement will be divided into two tranches, with tranche one representing 24.6 million shares to be completed within Cokal’s 15% placement capacity.

Tranche two will be completed subject to shareholder approval at a meeting in early 2012.

Cokal executive chairman Peter Lynch said he was pleased to have the support of a shareholder that had a reputation for long-term growth orientated investments.

“The placement to Blackrock will take our cash resources to $34 million,” Lynch said.

“This represents sufficient funds to deliver all of Cokal’s planned exploration and development programs for the next eighteen months to two years.

“Cokal is continuing to explore its Bumi Barito mineral project and is expecting to define an initial resource in compliance with the JORC code by the end of this calendar year.”

The Bumi Barito project covers an area of 19,920 hectares in the North Barito Basin of Kalimantan, adjacent to BHP Billiton’s Juloi tenement.

There are currently four drill rigs operating across the project.

To date, the drilling program at Bumi Barito has confirmed the presence of high-quality premium metallurgical coal at the site.