Canada’s oilfield services provider Ensign Energy Services Inc. said on Nov. 27 about 56% of Trinidad Drilling Ltd.’s shares have been tendered in its hostile offer, with rival bidder Precision Drilling Corp. walking away.
Precision and Trinidad’s shares both closed up more than 2.5%, while Ensign ended down 8.8%.
Ensign said the tendered shares helped meet the statutory minimum condition for its C$947-million hostile offer. The company now owns 66.18% of Trinidad shares, including stock in the company it previously owned.
Precision said on Nov. 27 it was awaiting payment of the termination fee of $20 million based on its agreement with Trinidad.
The rival bids underscored how oilfield service providers are looking to cushion the impact of Canadian oil producers tapping the brakes on spending, as pipeline bottlenecks result in wide discounts for Western Canada Select heavy crude to U.S. benchmark crude.
Ensign decided to launch the bid in August after Trinidad completed a strategic review it began in February, while North American drilling contractor Precision in October offered a deal valued at C$1.03 billion.
Trinidad’s board had rejected the C$1.68 per share all-cash bid from Ensign and instead urged shareholders to accept an all-stock offer from Precision.
Recommended Reading
TotalEnergies, Vanguard Renewables Form RNG JV in US
2024-04-24 - Total Energies and Vanguard Renewable’s equally owned joint venture initially aims to advance 10 RNG projects into construction during the next 12 months.
California Resources Corp., Aera Energy to Combine in $2.1B Merger
2024-02-07 - The announced combination between California Resources and Aera Energy comes one year after Exxon and Shell closed the sale of Aera to a German asset manager for $4 billion.
TotalEnergies Buys Majority Stake in Ecoslops Provence JV
2024-03-01 - TotalEnergies bought out its joint venture partner to become the sole shareholder in cleantech venture Ecoslops Provence.
SCF Acquires Flowchem, Val-Tex and Sealweld
2024-03-04 - Flowchem, Val-Tex and Sealweld were formerly part of Entegris Inc.
Enbridge Closes First Utility Transaction with Dominion for $6.6B
2024-03-07 - Enbridge’s purchase of The East Ohio Gas Co. from Dominion is part of $14 billion in M&A the companies announced in September.