Watson Farley & Williams (“WFW”) advised Trafigura as junior lender on a financing granted to Chappal Energies for the acquisition of the entire issued share capital of Equinor’s Nigerian subsidiary, Equinor Nigeria Energy Company Limited, for an upfront purchase price of US$710m.
The acquisition includes Equinor’s 20.21% share of the Agbami offshore oil field operated by Chevron. It is Chappal’s inaugural acquisition and a significant deal for Nigeria following a trend of supermajors and national oil companies selling non-strategic assets.
Chappal Energies is a new independent energy company focussed on investments in deep value and brownfield upstream opportunities within Africa.
The WFW London Projects team that advised Trafigura was led by Partner Joe Levin, working closely with Associates Tara Goalen, Sindana Ulaganathan and Georgina Somers. Global Oil & Gas Sector Head Partner Chris Kilburn and Associate Shaun Young provided M&A advice, Partner Heike Trischmann advised on due diligence, Partner Claire Miles and Associate Pip Moss provided tax advice and Partner Nick Walker and Associate Hamish Ungless advised on ESG aspects of the deal.
Joe commented: “We are very pleased to have once again worked with the upstream finance team at Trafigura, having previously supported them on recent financings for Gran Tierra and Afentra. Over the last few years, traders have become increasingly essential to successful acquisition upstream financings, and their flexibility whereby they can provide senior and/or junior debt has become key to getting transactions over the line”.
