COMPANY NEWS UPDATE: 1-Mitsubishi buying 20 pct Ivory Coast oilfield stake from Anadarko

TOKYO, (Reuters) - Japanese trading house Mitsubishi Corp is buying a 20 percent stake in an offshore oilfield in Ivory Coast from U.S. firm Anadarko Petroleum , in what will be the first Japanese oilfield stake purchase in the African country.

Mitsubishi said in a statement on Friday it is buying the stake in the deepwater oilfield block CI-103, located about 50 km (31 miles) off the coast of Cote d'Ivoire. It declined to comment on the value of the stake.

Anadarko currently controls 55 percent of the block, while London-based Tullow Oil and Ivorian state oil company Petroci have 30 percent and 15 percent, respectively.

The Nikkei business daily earlier said the project could cost 800 billion yen ($7.46 billion), but a Mitsubishi spokesman termed it speculation.

Ivory Coast, French-speaking West Africa's largest economy, is seeking to accelerate development of its energy sector, neglected during a decade-long political crisis that ended in a brief civil war in 2011.

The oil ministry signed 18 production-sharing agreements in 18 months in 2012 and 2013, as investors bet it could emulate Ghana's hydrocarbons boom. Companies such as Anadarko drilled 10 wells last year alone - twice the number during the whole of the decade-long political crisis.

Mitsubishi said crude production from the oilfield is targeted to begin in 2019. An exploratory well drilled in 2012 has confirmed oil and gas deposits, and further evaluation works and drilling of additional appraisal wells are in the works.

Oil and gas reserves in the block are currently estimated at 300 million barrels, and peak daily production may reach 60,000 barrels per day, the Mitsubishi spokesman said. Mitsubishi's equity share would be 13,000 bpd, making it the firm's biggest concession in Africa.

Anadarko and the partners could make a final investment decision on the project at the end of 2015, the spokesman added. (1 US dollar = 107.2600 Japanese yen) (Reporting by Osamu Tsukimori and Bangalore Newsroom; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)


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