ENI pulls out of takeover talks with rival Tullow
ENERGY group Tullow Oil saw its share price close 1.8 per cent down at 1,158p yesterday, after the Italian state oil group ENI decided against an offer for the group.
ENI is said to think that a bid would be too expensive after completing due diligence and pricing its African assets.
Tullow’s share price was also hit after Citigroup downgraded its recommendation from “buy” to “hold”, and crude oil fell for the third day in a row.
ENI had been cited as one of the frontrunners to buy up a stake in Tullow’s Ugandan Ngassa-2 prospect project.
Tullow’s Jubilee oil field, which is in Ghana, is set to come on stream late next year when it will produce about 140,000 barrels of oil per day.
It jumped to a record high last week after announcing the discovery of a deep-water oil prospect on the Venus well near Sierra Leone.