Westcoast Energy Inc. announced Thursday that its securityholders, at a special meeting in Vancouver, overwhelmingly approved its acquisition by Duke Energy. Over 96% of the votes cast were in favor of Duke’s US$8.5 billion bid for the major Canadian pipeline company. The purchase price includes assumption of about $4 billion in debt.

The shareholders also approved a resolution to waive Westcoast’s shareholder rights protection plan with respect to the acquisition by Duke Energy.

“The acquisition by Duke Energy was recommended to the securityholders by the Board of Directors as being in the best interests of Westcoast and the securityholders,” said Westcoast CEO Michael Phelps. “Obviously by the vote taken here today, securityholders have clearly supported that recommendation.

“This vote moves us one step closer to completing the transaction. Subject to obtaining court and other regulatory approvals, we anticipate that the arrangement will be completed in the first quarter of 2002,” Phelps said.

Duke and Westcoast announced the merger in late September (see Daily GPI, Sept. 21). Westcoast has assets of approximately $15 billion. The Company’s interests include natural gas gathering, processing, transmission, storage and distribution, as well as power generation, international energy businesses, and financial, information technology and energy services businesses.

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