There are signs of softening in the oil and gas merger market. After months of agreeing to disagree, sellers are finally parting with prime assets while buyers are finding a way to pay. The reversal arrived in dramatic fashion on the international stage in April. In the biggest oil and gas deal in a decade, Royal Dutch Shell announced its intention to acquire British BG Group Pic for US$70 billion. For context, Evaluate Energy said the total of all global upstream oil and gas merger and acquisition activity in the first quarter of 2015 was only US$7.1 billion. This represented a reduction of 79 per cent compared to the value in the first quarter of 2014 and a striking decline of 85 per cent compared to the average value per quarter since the start of 2009.
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