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Gold/Mining/Energy : XON - Exxon Corp. -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: denise v. who wrote (212)	12/1/1998 8:59:00 AM
From: Kevin G. O'Neill	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 242

Buyout of Mobil just confirmed: price $100 in XON stock. [via CNBC; eom]

To: denise v. who wrote (212)	12/1/1998 5:44:00 PM
From: Terry Lyon	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 242

Here's more news: Tuesday December 1, 3:25 pm Eastern Time Exxon and Mobil to win oil's great game - analysts By David Chance NEW YORK, Dec 1 (Reuters) - Exxon Corp.'s (NYSE:XON - news) record deal to buy Mobil Corp. (NYSE:MOB - news) will allow two of the world's largest companies to weather the worst oil prices in a quarter of a century and position them at the head of the pack for any recovery. While the deal reunites two of the seven sisters orphaned by the 1911 breakup of John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil Trust, analysts do not expect any big anti-competitive issues to be raised in the United States because gasoline prices are at their cheapest levels on record and competition is intense. The merger is not only the biggest deal in history but it fundamentally recreates the oil map: it puts together a powerhouse that has more in common with the biggest oil producing nations in the world, such as Saudi Arabia and Venezuela, than other oil and gas companies. It creates the world's largest publicly traded company in terms of revenue and will have a combined workforce of about 127,000 before any job cuts. ''These two companies are rearranging the seats around the table of the biggest game in town. They are prepared for $12 oil, they are looking beyond that,'' said Fadel Gheit, analyst at Fahnestock & Co. In a reference to the ''great game'', the 19th century battle between Britain and Russia for control of India, analysts said that Exxon Mobil Corp., as the new company will be called, would be the clear winner in any battle for control of the world's oil reserves. It brings together two companies with combined net income in 1997 of $11.8 billion and revenue of $203 billion. In its announcement, Exxon said it would pay $80.1 billion for Mobil, based on Monday's stock price, using its own stock. The two companies confirmed last Friday they were in talks. Mobil shareholders will receive 1.32015 Exxon shares for each Mobil share they hold and analysts said they expect the deal to add five percent to Exxon earnings in the first year of operations. ''Two and two could make five. There are not many acquisitions which could have had that impact for Exxon,'' said Eugene Nowak, analyst at ABN AMRO Inc. Gheit at Fahnestock expects the two companies will clear U.S. regulatory hurdles with ease, but said European antitrust authorities would probably want to take a look at the impact of the deal on its gasoline sales market. ''This will be a company with a market capitalization of $260 billion. It can afford to throw the regulators a crumb of say $5.0 billion,'' in asset sales or divestments, he said. In what analysts said was a clear reference to U.S. regulators and to a joint venture between Royal Dutch/Shell Group (quote from Yahoo! UK & Ireland: SHEL.L), Texaco Inc. (NYSE:TX - news) and Saudi Aramco, as well as British Petroleum Co. Plc's (quote from Yahoo! UK & Ireland: BP.L) pending acquisition of Amoco Corp. (NYSE:AN - news), Exxon and Mobil said they do not expect any big antitrust problems. ''In the U.S., Exxon Mobil will approach the size and scale nationally and regionally of the new downstream joint venture companies announced by other major competitors,'' the companies said. The sheer size of the behemoth created by the merger of the biggest publicly traded oil company in the world and Mobil, the No. 2 U.S. oil company and No. 4 in the world, is enough to awe anyone, analysts said. It also brings together two companies with the ability to win projects in arenas that others can only dream of. Saudi Arabia, which has the biggest oil reserves in the world, recently announced that it was talking to Western companies about opening up its closed oil and natural gas sectors. Mobil's liquefied natural gas expertise combined with Exxon's patent processes for transforming natural gas into more valuable and tradable oil makes the two companies the top of any wish-list for the Saudis, analysts say. ''These two companies have assembled an all-star team, the two chief executives, Lee Raymond of Exxon and Lucio Noto of Mobil have crowned their careers with the biggest play ever,'' said Gheit. Raymond will be President and Chief Executive of the new company and Noto will be Vice Chairman.