Weil, Gotshal and Covington & Burling to handle antitrust side of Exxon/XTO Energy deal

Reported by:  Gregory Bufithis and Alex Hania

Weil, Gotshal and Covington & Burling will provide antitrust counsel to Exxon, and handle the second request.   Covington has long been Exxon’s go-to antitrust counsel, and the firm guided Exxon through the antitrust process after its acquisition of Mobil.   Both firms indicated the deal will likely win antitrust approval even though the industry is relatively concentrated, an opinon repeated by other antitrust lawyers not involved in the deal.  Most said that a quick analysis of the marketplace and the competitive impact show a minimal effect.   The review will be done in D.C.  and by Covington which does direct hire;  they have an enormous database of contract attorneys so we assume  there will not be the usual staffing agency recruitment involved.

With the deal Exxon will become the top U.S. natural gas producer at a time that natural gas is expanding its share in the world’s largest energy market.   There is an expectation of a wave of consolidation in the energy industry as cash-rich companies such as Exxon move to snap up smaller players with attractive assets.  We just came back from a conference on the oil & gas industry and the “buzz” was there will be many more of these deals which will make the industry more resilient to volatility in natural gas prices.

This post will be updated as we learn more.