Talos Energy will terminate the poison pill following an agreement with Carlos Slim’s firm

Talos Energy announced on Tuesday that it will terminate its "poison pill" after reaching an agreement with the investment firm of Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim, which stipulates that it won't exceed a 25% threshold in the oil company.

The company adopted the Shareholder Rights Plan in October after Slim's Control Empresarial De Capitales had accumulated 24 percent of Talos common stock.

Corporates often use the poison pill or shareholder rights plan to deter hostile takeover bids.

Talos announced on Tuesday that it had entered into an agreement to prevent the investor group from acquiring additional shares of Talos' common stock until Dec. 16, 2025. This would have caused its holdings to surpass 25%.

Separately Houston-based Talos announced that it would sell a 30.1% additional interest in its Mexico division to Zamajal – owned by Grupo carso, 90%, and Control Empresarial 10%, both backed by Carlos Slim.

The unit of Grupo CARSO purchased 49.9% of Talos Mexico last year.

Talos Energy, which will hold 20% of Talos Mexico after the deal is closed, will have the remaining 60% held by Zamajal.

Talos Energy will receive cash payments of $49.7 millions, plus an additional $33million upon the first commercial production at Zama Field.

Talos Energy's Mexican subsidiary, which discovered the Zama Field last year, controls 17.4% of this potentially lucrative deposit located in Mexican waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Reporting by Tanay dhumal, Bengaluru. Editing by Shilpa Majumdar

(source: Reuters)