PTTEP Seals Deal for Murphy’s Malay Assets

Thai oil and gas firm PTTEP announced July 10 that it has completed the $2.1bn acquisition of two Malaysian offshore fields from Murphy Oil.

Murphy announced in March that it had agreed to sell all of its Malaysian assets to state-owned PTTEP for $2.127bn. PTTEP will pay a $100mn bonus payment contingent upon certain future exploratory drilling results before October 2020.

PTTEP said July 10 that all conditions to allow the deal to proceed have now been met. The Thai company said its sales volume will rise by some 48,000 barrels of oil equivalent (boe)/day, ramping up to 60,000-70,000 boe/d in 2022.

The sale marks Murphy’s exit from Malaysia after 20 years of operations. The US-based company said in March that it had proven reserves of 129mn boe in Malaysia, 70mn boe of which were proved but undeveloped. The proved reserves are comprised of 468bn ft³ of natural gas and 51mn barrels of liquids.

PTTEP has previously said that the acquisition includes five exploration and production projects – the Sabah K project, the SK309 & SK311 project, the Sabah H project, the SK314A project, and the SK405B project.