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BHP chairman says $20 billion investment in shale was a mistake

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thackney:
BHP chairman says $20 billion investment in shale was a mistake
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-bhp-shale-idUSKBN19K1UZ
 Jun 29, 2017

BHP Billiton's Chairman Jac Nasser said on Thursday BHP's $20 billion investment in U.S. shale oil and gas six years ago was, in hindsight, a mistake.

BHP entered the shale business at the height of the fracking boom in 2011 and invested billions more developing the operations. The fall in oil prices since then has led to pre-tax writedowns of about $13 billion on the business. Activist shareholder and hedge fund Elliott Management, holding 4.1 percent of BHP's London-listed shares, has been trying to gain support from other shareholders to persuade BHP to sell the shale oil and gas business.

"If you had to turn the clock back, and if we knew what we knew today, we wouldn't do it, of course we wouldn't do it, but go back and put yourself in our position at that time," Nasser told a business seminar, referring to the shale purchase.

"We bought exactly what we thought we were buying, but the timing was way off."

New York-based Elliott has directed a barrage of criticism at the global miner since releasing a list of changes in April it wants the company to implement.

Its list includes an exit from shale, removal of BHP's dual London and Australian stock listings and greater emphasis on shareholder returns. Nasser would not comment on Elliott's proposal. But he defended BHP's performance, saying the company's shareholder returns were up 486 percent since BHP merged with Billiton Plc in 2001....

IsailedawayfromFR:
Bhp stepped into it when it bought Petrohawk, the discoverer of the Eagleford.  The company had decent acreage but it was too gassy.  EOG figured out the liquids -rich window and made the real money.

Made Petrohawk mgt very wealthy and BHP shareholders poorer.

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