In the summer of 2014, with Brent crude hovering around $110 (U.S.) a barrel, the Spanish energy giant Repsol approached Talisman Energy with the beginnings of an acquisition offer. It was right around then that the price of oil began its precipitous descent, falling a gut-wrenching 40 per cent by May, 2015, when the deal, miraculously, closed.
How does a transaction survive such drama? The real question, according to the lawyers on the deal, is whether the Repsol-Talisman tie-up could have happened without the collapse in oil prices.
Lexpert senior editor David Dias interviews lawyers on the deal at www.lexpert.ca/globe.