John Fredriksen has increased his stake in Oslo-listed Avance Gas after rival owners had moved to snap up the VLGC company's stock.

Avance Gas said it had completed a NOK 555m ($65.4m) sale of 12.9m new shares on Friday. The deal was aimed at raising money for general corporate use and to partly finance its newbuilding programme of four VLGCs at Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering in South Korea.