-- Japanese trading house Marubeni says to buy 35% stake in Eagle Ford shale oil and gas project
-- Move is latest foray by Japanese firm to get in on booming shale business
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By Shawn Schroter
Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
TOKYO -(Dow Jones)- Marubeni Corp. (8002.TO) said Friday that it has agreed to buy a 35% stake in the Eagle Ford shale oil and gas play from Dallas-based Hunt Oil.
Marubeni is the latest in a string of overseas companies to buy American shale asset stakes. It and other Japanese companies have been eager to gain access to more gas in the aftermath of the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, which directly and indirectly led to the idling of most of the country's nuclear-power generation capacity.
The Japanese trading house said that the Texas project, which covers around 52,000 acres of oil and gas leases, has plans for several hundred wells to be sequentially drilled over five-10 years, with total development costs of approximately $1.3 billion.
Marubeni and Hunt have also agreed to jointly acquire additional acreage in the Eagle Ford shale oil and gas area, it said.
"We believe that this project, including future expansion and the potential new businesses associated with it, will become a solid base for Marubeni, providing a strong cash flow and profit on the mid- to long-term basis," the company said in a statement.
Among Japanese companies to buy American assets last year, JGC Corp. (1963.TO) said in June that it would buy a 10% stake in a shale oil block in the Eagle Ford Shale from TriTech 1 LLC for about $65 million.
Just this week, China Petrochemical Corp. struck a multibillion dollar deal with Devon Energy Corp. (DVN) for a one-third stake in five U.S. shale oil and gas fields, while French oil giant Total SA (FP.FR) purchased a minority stake in a swath of Chesapeake Energy Corp.'s (CHK) Ohio shale discovery for $2.32 billion.
-By Shawn Schroter, Dow Jones Newswires; +81-3-6269-2772; shawn.schroter@dowjones.com
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