Fredriksen considering buying more Seadrill shares- newspaper

Billionaire investor John Fredriksen is considering buying more shares in oil rig operator Seadrill after the stock’s sharp fall this year, Norwegian business daily Finansavisen reported on Monday.

“Seadrill is the most important company in the John Fredriksen group,” he told the paper.” That’s the company I will spend the most time and energy on in the time to come, and buying more shares is under consideration given the latest share price developments.”

Seadrill, the world’s biggest oil rig firm by market capitalisation, has struggled this year and its shares are down 26 percent since the start of the year, underperforming a 5 percent rise on the European oil and gas index.

With oil companies reining in capital spending and dozens of new deepwater rigs entering the market, charter rates have dropped by more than a third and drilling executives expect the market to remain difficult for another two years.

Board member Tor Olav Troeim on Friday announced his abrupt resignation from the Seadrill board, just weeks after quitting his job as an executive of a Fredriksen holding company. He’s also leaving the boards of Archer and Marine Harvest .

Troeim had said on July 29 that he would remain on the board of Seadrill and several other companies controlled by Fredriksen and did not explain why he has now decided to leave.

Fredriksen, originally from Norway but now living in London with a Cypriot passport, controls a plethora of companies, including shipping firms Frontline and Golden Ocean and fish farmer Marine Harvest.
Source: Reuters (Reporting by Terje Solsvik; Editing by Balazs Koranyi)