Salamander agrees to buy GFI Oil & Gas assets at $220m

London Stock Exchange-listed firm Salamander Energy announced on Friday that it has agreed the terms of a proposed acquisition with Calgary-based oil, gas company GFI Oil& Gas Corp. for a total consideration of approximately ?96 million or about US$220 million.

Under the terms of the recommended proposed acquisition, Salamander will acquire, for cash and shares, the entire issued and to be issued shares in the capital of GFI, it said.

The company said that a call option agreement provides Salamander with an option to acquire all of the issued and outstanding shares of Duinord Glagah Kambuna Inc.,a wholly-owned subsidiary of GFI, holds GFI's interest in the Kambuna field for a purchase price equal to US$45 million subject to certain adjustments.

The proposed acquisition is expected to complete during the first quarter of 2008.

According to Salamander, GFI is an international oil and gas exploration and development company with an interest in the Glagah Kambuna Technical Assistance Contract (TAC) containing the Kambuna gas field, the Seruway Production Sharing Contract (PSC) both of which are located in Indonesia, and Block B8/38 located in the Gulf of Thailand containing the Bualuang oil field.

In Oct 2007, GFI said that its net share of proved and probable reserves for the Kambuna TAC, offshore North Sumatra, is estimated at 25.7 billion cubic feet of gas and 1.8 million barrels of condensate.

Salamander is an independent upstream oil and gas exploration and production company focused on South East Asia, with existing assets in Indonesia including Bontang PSC (70, operator), Simenggaris PSC-JOB (21 %), SES PSC (5 %) and ONWJ PSC (5 %). (denny)