Denver-based energy firm Venoco Inc. said Monday it has agreed to accept a private buyout offer from the company’s chief executive, oilman and philanthropist Tim Marquez.
Marquez will pay $12.50 a share for the 49.7 percent of Venoco that he doesn’t already own in a deal valued at about $382.7 million.
The offer represents a premium of 63 percent to Venoco’s closing price of $7.69 a share on Friday. U.S. stock markets were closed Monday for the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday.
In August, Marquez had proposed a buyout at $12.50 a share. However, the offer at the time gave a premium to shareholders of only 39 percent to Venoco’s then-current share price of $8.98.
The offer was approved unanimously by a special committee of Venoco’s board of directors, then ratified by the board with Marquez abstaining.
The deal is contingent on a vote of Venoco’s public shareholders and on Marquez obtaining financing for the transaction.
Marquez is known by many Denver ites not for the oil and gas firm he runs but for his act of creating, with his wife, Bernadette, a $50 million matching-gift college scholarship program for Denver Public Schools graduates.
Marquez co-founded Venoco in 1992 and built it into one of the largest oil and gas companies operating in California.
The scholarship fund was created after Marquez spun off about half of Venoco in a 2006 initial public offering that raised $212.5 million.
Marquez said Monday in a statement that the buyout offer “will deliver significant value to our public shareholders. This transaction will position Venoco for the long term and allow our company to continue investing in its future in an era of continued economic uncertainty.”
Mike Edwards, a Venoco vice president, said private ownership by Marquez is not expected to alter the company’s approach.
“The expectation is that day-to-day operations don’t change,” he said.
Venoco is sticking with its previously announced capital expenditure budget of $255 million for 2012, Edwards said.
Venoco is primarily an oil producer with holdings almost exclusively in California. It operates three offshore platforms in the Santa Barbara Channel and has onshore properties in Southern California and in northern California’s Sacramento Basin.
Steve Raabe: 303-954-1948 or sraabe@denverpost.com
