Woodside, Oil Search Have Held Informal Talks: AFR Link

[Gator]

Woodside, Oil Search Have Held Informal Talks: AFR

2014-05-21 20:22:25.254 GMT

By James Thornhill

     May 22 (Bloomberg) -- Woodside Chairman Michael Chaney and

Oil Search Chairman Rick Lee have held informal talks at least

twice on a potential $11b-plus deal, Australian Financial Review

reports citing unidentified sources.

  * Talks have been “casual and inconclusive": AFR

  * Woodside has concerns over high level of sovereign risk

    faced by producers in Papua New Guinea: AFR

  * NOTE: Woodside on Wednesday said it had scrapped an

    agreement to buy a quarter stake in Israel’s largest natural

    gas field for up to $2.6b, see: NSN N5XGWV6K50YD<GO>

Link to article: http://goo.gl/DAcR3k (subs. reqd.)

[Palm]

Thanks Gator. It's been clear for quite a while that Woodside has a real interest in OSH and this proves there's no denying it. Interesting comment on the sovereign risk; seems the bigger sovereign "risk" is whether PNG sees OSH as a "national interest" company that they would not allow to be bought.

[Gator]

I would also think spending Billion$ off the coast in the Middle East would have more sovereign risk than buying anything in PNG

[my2cows]

and how smart would it be to expand operations in Austrialia given their crazy high priced deep water, labor and tax structure.

They could buy IOC for a 1.50/mcf, AND all of IOC's current management IS woodside executives. Just saying... IOC and Woodside executives have a long built-in relatioship.