Glencore PLC and Off The Shelf Investments Fifty Six (RF) Proprietary Ltd are in the running to purchase Chevron Corp.'s South African assets in a 75/25 joint deal estimated to be worth US$900 million, a source familiar with the matter told S&P Global Market Intelligence on June 6.
Business Day reported previously that Glencore and South Africa's Public Investment Corp., which invests the pensions of civil servants, could emerge in a 50/50 joint bid to scoop up the assets, which include a 100,000-barrel per day refinery in Cape Town and more than 800 gas stations in South Africa and Botswana.
In 2017, Chevron agreed to sell its 75% stake in the assets to China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., or Sinopec, for $900 million. However, as a 25% stakeholder and Chevron's black empowerment partner, or BEE, the minority investor group partner Off the Shelf, backed by Glencore, exercised its pre-emptive right on the stake. Companies operating in South Africa are required to have a BEE partner with a shareholding of around 25%.
Braden Reddall, Chevron's senior external affairs adviser for downstream, midstream and corporate affairs, declined to comment on the status of the African asset sale.
