Acquisitions & Divestitures

Three of the largest M&A deals of the past couple of months have been for oil-weighted producers, and all three buyers are funds—one private equity and two special-purpose acquisition companies (SPACs).

Publicly held SPAC United Refining Energy Corp. has bid $580 million for privately held Chaparral Energy Inc., whose 146 million barrels of oil equivalent (BOE) are 62% oil. Edge Petroleum Corp. planned to buy Chaparral last year but the deal fell through over post-commodity-price-collapse financing, and Edge is now in Chapter 11 proceedings.

Tom Hicks’ publicly held SPAC, Hicks ...