Surging prices for oil and natural gas shales, in at least one case rising 10-fold in five weeks, are raising concern of a bubble as valuations of drilling acreage approach the peak set before the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. Chinese, French and Japanese energy explorers committed more than $8 billion in the past [...]
Never mind that hydraulic fracturing was once again linked to an earthquake, this time a 4.0 tremor in Ohio on New Year’s Eve, the year 2012 kicked off in impressive fashion for the shale industry, which has been revolutionized by the controversial drilling practice. Undaunted by the environmental and geological challenges, two oil giants signed [...]
Nikkei business daily is reporting that Marubeni Corp will spend $1.3 billion on buying a 35 percent stake in a Texas-based shale oil and gas project from Hunt Oil Co. The Japanese trading house plans to raise output in the Eagle Ford shale to over 10,000 barrels per day in around five years, the report [...]
Marathon Oil plans $4.8 billion in capital spending for 2012, a 24 percent increase from its 2011 capital budget, the company said Wednesday. About one-third of the spending will target operations in the Eagle Ford Shale, the Houston-based company said. Marathon Oil plans to increase its presence in the South Texas shale play, increasing the number [...]
Natural gas-focused explorer EXCO Resources Inc said it has been approached for at least 10 deals in the range of $50-$100 million each, as it looks to tap more liquids-rich plays. “We are looking at four deals in the Bakken, three or four deals in Eagle Ford, three or four deals in West Texas,” a [...]
BHP Billiton is acquiring shale specialist Petrohawk Energy Corporation in an all-cash tender offer valued at approximately US$12.1 billion and a total enterprise value of approximately US$15.1 billion, including the assumption of net debt. BHP made its first big splash in the unconventional hydrocarbons with a deal to buy Chesapeake Energy’s Arkansas-based gas business for [...]
Exxon Mobil Corp. will continue acquiring shale gas assets in United States to take advantage of low natural gas prices, said a senior executive of the company’s XTO Energy Inc. subsidiary. “We think the market dynamics are set up to where you can potentially get good value, so we will continue to look,” XTO Energy [...]
GAIL (India) Ltd., the state-run gas utility, is reportedly making a non-binding bid for acquiring 20% interest in shale gas assets owned by a US company. The deal is estimated to be valued at $400-500 million, persons familiar with the negotiations said. The Times of India newspaper did not identifying the US company, but said [...]
The global natural gas surplus is disappearing sooner than expected, thanks to rebounding economies and troubles in Japan and the Middle East, according to panelists at the Offshore Technology Conference on Wednesday. The global recession, combined with a surge in natural gas production from prolific shale formations in the United States, sent supplies of the blue-burning [...]
North American shale gas plays could be the beneficiary of redirected capital flows as Talisman Energy Inc. says that it will “reconsider” future development in the North Sea. John A. Manzoni, President and Chief Executive of Talisman, made that comment which stems as the result of March’s unexpected tax increase of 12 percentage points in the United [...]
