Oklahoma is one of the focus targets by Houston’s Marathon Oil after selling its take in Libyan oil acreage for $450 million to French oil giant total.
Marathon indicated it wanted to depart what it felt was an unstable region and focus on oil production growth in the shale regions of Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico and North Dakota.
At the same time, Marathon indicated it is downsizing. But principally, the problem in Libya has been the unrest. Libya has no central command and Marathon’s stake had been in the Waha oil region which is controlled by the Libyan National Army. Marathon sold its 16.33 percent stake in the region.
The exit from Libya is a pattern for Marathon which did the same in other countries over the past few years.”
“Today’s announcement to divest Libya at an attractive valuation continues the simplification and concentration of our portfolio to the high margin, high return U.S. resource plays,” said Marathon CEO Lee Tillman.