eSense Labs says the UK pilot deal for its lemon terpene liquid made $US18,000 since March.

The ASX is questioning the company (ASX:ESE) about when it started selling to the anonymous company after its share price surged 75 per cent.

Just one day earlier, eSense had to admit that it is renegotiating up to $1.6m worth of contracts where the other parties just never paid.

eSense stock is up again on Thursday, rising 77 per cent to 11.5c.

Normally, news that the ASX is investigating a company is not considered reason to buy in.

eSense told the ASX that the UK company — which it refused to publicly name in spite of the ASX requesting it do so on the grounds of commercial confidentiality — had started trialing the terpene liquid in March.

eSense shares over the last 12 months.

Terpenes are fragrant oils found in plants that carry flavour and aroma. They carry the pungent odour of cannabis and offer some medicinal properties — but they don’t contain THC, the compound that gets you stoned, or cannabidiol (CBD), another restricted element in cannabis.

The UK company has bought 7 litres in total, worth $US18,000. The first litre was sold at $US3000, and the rest at $US2500.

The ASX specifically asked whether eSense had received any of those payments — the company says this time it has been paid in advance.

The UK news is the only likely news-based catalyst for the massive share price ramp up, as other news this week consisted of a $3.15m capital raising and that it never received the promised $1.6m from contracts signed in 2017 and 2016.

The ASX wanted to know whether these details were known before the capital raising, managed by a Sydney corporate advisor, took place.

“Details of the shipments to the UK party were known to eSense prior to the release of the capital raising announcement,” eSense said.

They added that the low dollar amount and the fact that they were uncertain about the outcome of the program, even though it had been running for eight months and they were able to announce a resolution a day after the capital raising announcement; therefore they didn’t think they were obliged to disclose it.

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