Japan to float Inpex

Japan's government may raise more than $1 billion in an initial public sale of shares in Inpex Corp., a unit of the state-owned oil company it's dismantling for failing to meet the nation's energy needs, Bloomberg reported Monday.

The government will finish integrating Inpex and two other units of Japan National Oil Corp. this month, paving the way for a share sale as early as June, bankers advising on the merger, who asked not to be identified, said. Banks will be invited to bid to underwrite the share sale as early as this week, the bankers said.

Inpex is being merged with Japan Oil Development Co., which focuses on exploration and development in the United Arab Emirates in the Middle East, and Sakhalin Oil & Gas Development Co., which focuses on development in the Sakhalin region of eastern Russia. Inpex, which was set up to focus on exploration in Indonesia, Asia's biggest exporter of oil and gas, agreed to buy a 10 percent stake in an Azerbaijan oil venture for $1.4 billion from Moscow- based Lukoil in December 2002

Inpex? Indonesian crown asset is 50 percent interest in Total SA-operated Mahakam PSC in East Kalimantan. Mahakam?s giant gas fields in main natural gas supplier to Badak LNG plant in Bontang, East Kalimantan.

Deutsche Bank AG and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. are advising Japan National Oil on the merger, while J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. and Nomura Holdings Inc. are advising Inpex. (*)