The DemandMy bet is this company could be worth a substantial amount more a year from now.
BHP Billiton Ltd., the world’s biggest mining company, agreed to buy Chesapeake Energy Corp.’s Fayetteville assets in central Arkansas for $4.75 billion in cash, entering the U.S. shale gas business.
Chesapeake agreed to sell all of its interests in about 487,000 net acres of properties in central Arkansas, the company said. The transaction is expected to close in the first half of this year, Chesapeake said.
BHP paid about $1.98 for each thousand cubic feet of estimated proven reserves, Michael Bodino, an analyst in Fort Worth, Texas with Global Hunter Securities, said in an interview after the announcement. In December, Exxon Mobil Corp. paid $1.92 per MCF of reserves when it acquired property in the Fayetteville Shale from Petrohawk Energy Corp.
Deal premiums this year have been announced at an average 24 percent premium, compared with last year’s average 19 percent.