Cenovus’ cash-and-stock agreement presented in August<\/a>. The new deal expires on Oct. 20. Strathcona previously offered $28.02 per share.<\/p>\nMEG said on Monday that its board of directors and a special committee will evaluate Strathcona\u2019s new offer, and respond on or before Sept. 15. Meanwhile, its shareholders are due to vote on Cenovus’ offer at an Oct. 9 shareholder meeting, where two-thirds approval is required.<\/p>\n
Cole Smead, portfolio manager and CEO of Smead Capital Management, says an offer over $30 per share is what MEG shareholders have been waiting for.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t see Cenovus chasing this over $30 [per share], as it would require a larger stock component, and would be viewed to be more dilutive,\u201d he told Yahoo Finance Canada.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe risk for Cenovus right now is they go to a proxy on Oct. 9, and they lose the vote. They\u2019ve got to go over $30 even to be able to compete,\u201d he added in a phone interview on Monday. \u201cThat\u2019s a big move.\u201d<\/p>\n
MEG is widely seen as the last opportunity for large-scale expansion in Canada\u2019s oilsands, an industry dominated by giants including Suncor Energy, Canadian Natural Resources, Imperial Oil, and Cenovus. A combination with Strathcona would create a new major producer, with output of more than 720,000 barrels per day.<\/p>\n
Strathcona owns or controls a 14.2 per cent stake in MEG.<\/p>\n
Smead estimates that 20 to 30 per cent of MEG shares are held by “arbitrageurs” looking to capitalize on an acquisition deal.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf [Cenovus] goes to that vote without moving the terms, there\u2019s a good risk that they lose the vote outright,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Yahoo Finance Canada has reached out to Cenovus for comment.<\/p>\n
Toronto-listed MEG shares were virtually flat in early trading on Tuesday at $29.03. The stock gained over two per cent in Monday’s session, adding to a more than 20 per cent rise year-to-date.<\/p>\n
Michael Spyker, principal analyst at oil and gas consultancy firm HTM Energy Partners, says the public bidding war for MEG is overshadowing the company’s value as an independent oilsands operator.<\/p>\n
“Any transaction for MEG shareholders should be benchmarked OVER THE VALUE OF STAYING INDEPENDENT (which is a narrative that has disappeared, sadly),” he wrote in a lengthy post on the social media platform X on Monday<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cenovus Energy logos are on display at the Global Energy Show in Calgary, Alta., Tuesday, June 7, 2022.THE…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":131740,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[45,49,48,71928,52758,71926,52757,71927],"class_list":["post-131739","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canadian-natural-resources","tag-cenovus-energy","tag-meg-energy","tag-strathcona","tag-strathcona-resources"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131739","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=131739"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131739\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/131740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=131739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=131739"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=131739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}