Lucapa Diamond Co. Ltd. has locked in US$15 million worth of debt financing to bring the Mothae diamond project in Lesotho into production in 2018.

The three-year facility, which has an annual interest rate of 13%, is being provided by private Singapore-based company Equigold Pte. Ltd., according to an Oct. 9 news release.

The financing deal gives Equigold the option of converting the last two of the eight quarterly repayments into Lucapa shares at the lowest one-day volume-weighted average price in the 15 days prior to the conversion.

Lucapa has been working to optimize phase one of the Mothae project to improve the economics by increasing production and bringing forward cash flows, with the results due out soon.