Shale Gas M&A Activity Show No Sign of Slowing

In a trend that shows no signs of slowing, a new report by Wood Mackenzie to be released Thursday reports that companies spent a record $21bn on acquisitions in the first half of 2010 to gain access to the US shale gas boom

The investments were up sharply from the $2bn spent in the first half of 2009 and beat the $19.7bn spent in 2008, the energy research group said in the report, to be released on Thursday.

"A resource opportunity of this scale is a game-changer,'' said Luke Parker, manager of Wood Mackenzie's M&A research service. "It is something that everyone will want to be involved in.''