Sinopec bids $4.65b for oil sands

China Petrochemical Corporation, also known as Sinopec, has made a US$4.65 billion bid for a stake in the Athabasca region of Canada’s Alberta province, reported the South China Morning Post. China’s second-largest oil and gas producer will purchase a 9.03% stake of Syncrude, which operates the 350,000 barrel per day project, from ConocoPhillips. The deal, which could add as much as 460.5 million barrels of reserves to Sinopec, represents China’s fifth-largest overseas energy acquisition and its largest acquisition in Canada. The bid was more than US$1 billion higher than the market expectation; one oil analyst forecast that oil prices woul have to rise above US$100 to justify the acquisition.