Jefferies snares $US2b SNE project mandate

AFR Article...

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Jefferies snares $US2b SNE project mandate

Sarah Thompson and Anthony Macdonald

May 8, 2019 — 9.31pm

US investment bank Jefferies is the adviser shopping around a stake in the $US2 billion ($2.9 billion) SNE development in Senegal.

Street Talk understands Jefferies globally, including its dealmakers in Europe and Australia, have been sounding potential buyers about a deal thought to be on behalf of joint venture partners FAR Ltd and Cairn Energy.

Jefferies has nabbed the SNE selldown gig.

The SNE field is to be developed in phases, with plans for about 500 million barrels of production in all, and output of 100,000 barrels a day, starting in 2022. The partners have been evaluating responses from contractors to tenders for the supply of equipment and engineering services.

London-listed Cairn has been known for some time to be a seller of its stake. However, FAR is still locked in an arbitration process to try to settle a dispute dating back to when Woodside bought a stake in the venture from ConocoPhillips for $US430 million.


Jefferies has nabbed the SNE selldown gig.  Supplied

FAR says its pre-emptive rights over the 35 per cent stake were ignored, a claim that Woodside chief executive Peter Coleman has dismissed as "frivolous and opportunistic".

Coleman said last week the company was aiming to reach a final go-ahead decision for the SNE project as soon as possible in the September quarter.

The move comes as African exploration assets have been thrown into focus through Total SA's $US8.8 billion deal to buy Anadarko Petroleum's African oil and gas portfolio should Occidental Petroleum win the takeover battle to acquire Anadarko.