Delek Drilling looks abroad to spin off Tamar stake

Delek Drilling is looking to spin off its remaining 22% stake in the offshore Tamar gas field in 2019, the company’s chief executive said on Monday.

Last year Delek spun off an initial 9.25% of Tamar into a new company in Tel Aviv called Tamar Petroleum. It said at the time it expected to receive $980 million for the sale.

CEO Yossi Abu said Delek Drilling is now changing its focus abroad, including the Euronext market, since the local market is already saturated.

“We are looking to duplicate what we did with Tamar Petroleum but in the international market. It’s a process that is gaining momentum and we hope to finish it in 2019,” Abu said at the Israel Energy & Business Convention.

Delek and its partners discovered Tamar in 2009 and began producing gas from the field in 2013. It is the second biggest gas reserve behind Leviathan, in which Delek also has a major stake.

In an effort to open the energy market to competition, the government is forcing Delek, which is a unit of conglomerate Delek Group, to sell its share of Tamar.

Tamar is Israel’s leading gas supplier and its owners have signed a multi-billion dollar export deal with an Egyptian buyer.

Abu said he hopes they will start exporting gas to Egypt in the first half of 2019.

Tamar Petroleum has expanded its stake in the field to 16.75%. Other shareholders are Texas-based Noble Energy with a 25% stake, Isramco with 28.75%, Dor Gas with 4%, and Everest Infrastructures holds the remaining 3.5%.