http://www.bloomberg.com
7-Eleven Australia is close to acquiring most of Exxon Mobil Corp's local filling stations, the Australian newspaper reported on its website, without saying where it got the information.
Caltex Australia Ltd., the nation's biggest oil refiner, last month scrapped plans to buy 302 filling stations from Exxon Mobil for A$300 million ($257 million) after the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission opposed the transaction on concerns the deal would lead to higher prices.
Exxon Mobil is looking at the options for its retail fuel business, Alan Bailey, a spokesman in Melbourne for the Texas- based company, said by telephone today.
He declined to comment on potential buyers of the filling stations. 7-Eleven is interested in acquisitions and has looked at a "multitude of opportunities," Melbourne-based spokeswoman Tracy Hammon said by telephone. No agreements have been reached, she said.
Exxon Mobil Australia wants to focus on natural-gas projects, with plans to spend "many billions of dollars" in Australia and Papua New Guinea in three to five years, the company's Australian Chairman John Dashwood said in an interview in Brisbane yesterday.
Filling stations are "not our business model," Dashwood said "I guess the distinction I make is, are you an oil and gas company or are you a groceries company? The industry has changed to the point where the two meld, and some have used the shop to move fuel. We're not in the business of being a shop."
Dashwood declined to reveal potential buyers. 7-Eleven Stores Pty. had 182 filling stations at the end of 2007 and was the second-largest of "independent" retailers that represent 7 percent of the market, according to the nation's antitrust regulator.
Mobil had 11 percent compared with the 16 percent outright share of Caltex and 22 percent it holds through a venture with Woolworths Ltd.
The Australian 7-Eleven is closely held by the Withers and Barlow families which brought the brand to Australia in 1976 through a license agreement with the U.S. company, then known as Southland Corp., the company said on its website.
