British oil services firm Hunting has agreed to acquire U.S. well specialist Titan Group for $775 million in a deal which will boost its exposure to the fast-growing shale oil and gas markets in North America, according to Reuters. Hunting said on Friday that it expected the acquisition to boost earnings by more than 30 percent in the first full financial year and that the deal would help fuel future growth through opportunities to supply the emerging Chinese shale gas market. "The next main market that we hope to tap into will be China. The Chinese need energy. I hope they will adopt the American technology and that's where we will provide our goods," said Finance Director Peter Rose in an interview. Driven by recurring domestic gas shortages, China has fast-tracked plans to explore its shale gas resources. Hunting's acquisition of Titan from energy-focused private equity firm Riverstone Holdings needs shareholder approval and is expected to complete in September. Titan's products are used to drill horizontal wells which pump oil and gas out of shale rocks, a technique which has prompted a boom in onshore drilling in the U.S. in recent years and revolutionised the country's energy market. "We've been waiting for something large that moves the dial because in the past they've made a series of smaller acquisitions. This is the large move," said Finncap analyst David Buxton, describing the deal as a "decent fit." The company said it would pay for Titan from existing cash balances plus a new bank facility of 375 million pounds ($612 million) and from the proceeds of a placing, also announced on Friday, which Rose said he expected to raise around 85 million pounds. Shares in Hunting, whose equipment is used in the construction and maintenance of oil wells, plunged 9 percent to 654.5 pence at 0920 GMT, underperforming Britain's mid-cap index which was 2.5 percent lower. "How much of that is the market and how much of that is the placing, it's difficult to determine but looking at the rest of the oil service sector, they're down 5 or 6 percent, so it looks as though there's an additional weakness coming through," said Buxton. UK-listed oil service companies Weir Group , Wood Group and Petrofac were down 6 percent, 4 percent and 3.7 percent respectively in morning trading on Friday. Hunting, which also said current trading was in line with its full-year expectations, added that advanced talks were underway to acquire other businesses worth up to 90 million pounds. Rose said the potential add-ons could close in the next two to three months and were in the precision engineering space, as opposed to shale oil and gas well operator Titan.
