A $6 billion oil deal signals yet another apex for the Blackstone Group. The sale of private equity-backed GeoSouthern Energy to Devon Energy comes at a high price by one important measure. Blackstone, one of GeoSouthern’s owners, also has an uncanny knack for timing. The glut of undeveloped land owned by oil companies suggests finding buyers will get tougher. Devon can justify the purchase price to its own shareholders, who roundly embraced the deal, using one metric. It is paying just 2.5 times projected 2015 earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization for GeoSouthern’s assets in the Texas-based Eagle Ford shale formation. Peers like Rosetta Resources are trading at a multiple of four. At $135,000 an acre, however, Devon shelled out about six times more than Marathon Oil paid two years ago to buy land in the same area from KKR and Hilcorp Resources. What’s more, Blackstone got in […]