INTERVIEW-Petrolinvest in financing talks with foreign funds

By Marynia Kruk and Pawel Bernat

WARSAW, June 3 (Reuters) - Polish upstream company Petrolinvest PROL.WA is in talks with foreign investment funds about financing its growth as it moves forward with developing Kazakh oil fields, its chief executive told Reuters.

Petrolinvest, which is controlled by Polish businessman Ryszard Krauze, has been exploring for oil and gas in Kazakhstan for a year but has yet to produce crude commercially.

It is moving forward with plans to buy a Kazakh company, Capital Energy, and boost holdings in two others, EmbaYugNeft and Occidental Resources Inc. to increase its access to their potentially lucrative oil fields.

The acquisitions will give Petrolinvest access to territories scattered throughout Kazakhstan.

Petrolinvest Chief Executive Pawel Gricuk said the deal, which will give Kazakh investors 40 percent of the company, would close within a month or two versus earlier expectations for the turn of May and June.

He said the size of additional financing would depend on the result of further drilling.

"Regardless of whether (Krauze's) Prokom Investments finances the next stages of our development, there is significant interest from foreign institutional investors," Gricuk said in an interview on Wednesday.

"We're in talks with foreign funds interested in financing the next stages of our growth," he said, but declined to provide further details.