Bankers in £2bn oil takeover scoop £68m fees jackpot

A £2.2bn oil takeover will hand bankers a £68m windfall – while putting 4,000 jobs at risk in the north Sea.

The bid by Wood group to snap up heavily- indebted Amec Foster Wheeler will create an energy services giant worth £5bn employing more than 64,000 people across the globe.

Last night details of the deal were revealed, including an offer to sell off most of Amec’s north Sea unit to satisfy competition officials – putting its 4,200 jobs under threat.

meanwhile it revealed brokers, lawyers and advisers will be sharing a fees bonanza. The £68m of transaction costs include £25m by the Wood group, which will be shared between credit Suisse, JP morgan, Pwc and law firm Slaughter & may.

Amec Foster Wheeler will pay up to £38m to advisers including goldman Sachs and Linklaters and nm rothschild for the north Sea sell off.

A few weeks ago, Standard Life’s £11bn merger with Aberdeen Asset management triggered a fees payout of nearly £100m, and put 800 jobs on the block.

A spokesman for union Unite said: ‘We will be urgently looking into this and speaking to both parties, seeking assurances for our members.’

Wood group wants to take over Amec to spread out its business in the face of falling oil prices which have hit customers and dried up contracts.

It had already said it would slash £150m from the combined group by shedding jobs and closing offices, and last night added another £15m of cuts.

Aside from the sale of Amec’s north Sea unit, it is expected about 1,280 jobs could be cut from the combined group. The takeover follows concerns about the health of the two businesses which have been hit by the downturn in the embattled oil industry. The oil price is hovering around $53, more than half of its highs of 2014.

Amec Foster Wheeler made £5.4bn in revenues last year but losses doubled to £542m, and it was poised to raise £500m through a rights issue just a week before the deal was announced. Its problems stem from an ill-judged takeover of Swiss rival Foster Wheeler in 2014 shortly before the global slump in oil prices. And Wood group had already been shedding staff and last year slashed about 18pc of its workforce, while revenues fell by 16pc.

But Wood group will still need to convince regulators the group’s combined 60pc share of the north Sea market will not pose a threat to competition – sparking its offer to the competitions and markets Authority.

Amec shareholders are due to vote on the deal in June.