Occidental Petroleum Corp’s move to sell its North Dakota acreage likely removes a logjam that had impeded U.S. oilfield deals for much of the year, though the deal’s price sets an unusually low bar for future deals and gives buyers the advantage over sellers. Oxy is selling all of its roughly 300,000 acres in North Dakota’s Bakken shale formation to a private equity fund in a deal valued around $500 million, sources familiar with the matter told Reuters. The price is roughly one-sixth, though, of what Wall Street had expected Oxy to fetch for the assets as recently as last year. Houston-based Oxy did not sell the North Dakota assets out of distress; indeed, it has $2.8 billion in cash in the bank. Rather, the deal removes an operational distraction from managers focused elsewhere and helps the company achieve its goal of being cash-flow neutral. Still, for ConocoPhillips, Whiting […]