LONDON, Aug. 8 (UPI) -- Danish shipping and oil giant A.P. Moller-Maersk AS will pay $2.95 billion for North Sea oilfields of Kerr-McGee Corp. as the U.S. company restructures.
The 10 fields in the British sector of the North Sea will expand the Danish company's oil output by about 60,000 barrels per day, the Copenhagen Post reported Monday.
Kerr-McGee Corp. of Oklahoma City is divesting itself of North Sea oil- and gas-producing assets after takeover artist Carl Icahn began pressuring the company to return more shareholder value.
That divesture strategy includes the company's decision to sell its interests in a cluster of smaller North Sea fields to Britain's Centrica PLC for $566 million. The acquisition will boost Centrica's oil production by about 17,000 barrels per day.
Kerr-McGee, which is pinning its future on domestic oil and natural gas operations, will use after-tax proceeds of about $3.1 billion to reduce debt.
Kerr-McGee's debt totaled about $7 billion as of last quarter after a stock-repurchase program calculated to repel Icahn's threats of a proxy contest.
