Chrysaor future: Acquisition of Shell North Sea portfolio

On 31st January, Chrysaor announced that it had agreed to acquire a portfolio of North Sea assets from Shell for USD3 billion. The transaction is expected to close in H2 2017 and will transform Chrysaor into one of the largest North Sea focussed E&P companies, who will adopt 400 staff from Shell as part of the deal. The full-cycle portfolio, which comprises exploration, near-term development and production, produced 115mboepd in 2016 and...

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What E&Ps do best: EnQuest acquires North Sea assets from BP for USD85 million

EnQuest has agreed to acquire a package of assets from BP, which includes a 25% operated interest in the Magnus field and various infrastructure interests, adding 15.9mmboe of 2P reserves and 4.2mboepd or production. EnQuest will consolidate its infrastructure interests by acquiring 3% in the Sullom Voe Terminal (currently hold 3%), 9% of the Northern Leg Gas Pipeline (currently hold 5.9%) and 3.8% of the Ninian Pipeline System (currently hold...

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Taq Taq Tumble

At the end of October, we raised the prospect of a potential downgrade at Taq Taq following a disappointing production update from Genel. On 24th January, Genel provided updated guidance of 24-31mbopd production average for the field in 2017, down from 60.2mbopd in 2016. The declining production from the field has already been well publicised, however the scale of the fall was unexpected. A new field development plan and reserves estimates are being currently being prepared and expected to be published within the coming months. Capital investment...

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BP Christmas shopping

BP has announced a series of high profile acquisitions in the past few weeks. The deals are in line with BP's longer term strategy of building in regions where they can gain "scale and materiality", although the company has moved more quickly than expected based on OGInsight's recent conversation with them, where BP said they were in divestment and portfolio rationalisation mode. This potentially signals a view of an improving oil price environment...

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Eni: Bringing in successive partners for Zohr

On 28th November, Eni announced the divestment a 10% interest in Zohr to BP for USD375 million plus pro-rata reimbursement of past costs (c.USD150 million net), bringing total consideration to USD525 million. BP also has an option to acquire an additional 5% interest on the same terms before the end of 2017. On 12th December, Eni announced that it had divested a further 30% interest in Zohr to Rosneft for USD1.125 billion and USD450 million...

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TransGlobe: Branching out...back to roots

This week saw Canadian listed, Egyptian focussed TransGlobe ‎announce an acquisition of producing assets in Western Canada. The company will be paying USD80 million to Bellatrix Exploration for Cardium light oil and Mannville liquid-rich gas acreage in the Harmattan Area. The portfolio comes with 21mmboe of 2P reserves and 3,100boepd of production. The acquisition is a shift away from the company's ‎historic strategy of being an Egyptian focussed player. However this had been pre-announced with TransGlobe stating earlier this year that it was...

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International Petroleum Investment Company: A fresh start

IPIC has been on a journey to rebuild its business following the extraordinary downfall of Khadem al-Qubaisi, the company’s managing director who was made to step down in April 2015. In the months that followed, there was a major shakeup across all levels of the organisation including in the portfolio companies, with many of the roles previously held by al-Qubaisi reassigned to new officers. At the time, IPIC did not release any statements around...

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