(Reuters) -Shell (SHEL)is in early talks to buy rival BP (BP), the Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday, citing people familiar with the matter.
BP’s American depository shares were up 6.5% as of 1604 GMT, while Shell’s were down 3.3%.
Talks between company representatives are active and BP is considering the approach carefully, the report added.
BP was valued at nearly $80 billion as of Wednesday while Shell had a market capitalisation of over $208 billion.
“As we have said many times before, we are sharply focused on capturing the value in Shell through continuing to focus on performance, discipline and simplification,” a Shell spokesperson said.
A BP spokesperson declined to comment.
Potential terms of any deal could not be learned and a tie-up is far from certain, the report said.
Shell CEO Wael Sawan has repeatedly said in recent weeks that Shell had a very high bar for big acquisitions and buying back Shell shares was a better allocation of money when asked about the possibility of a BP deal.
(Reporting by Prerna Bedi in Bengaluru, additional reporting by Shadia Nasralla in London. Editing by Arun Koyyur and Jane Merriman)
