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by Stockwatch Business Reporter

West Texas Intermediate crude for August delivery lost 68 cents to $51.65 on the New York Merc, while Brent for August added 20 cents to $57.05 (all figures in this para U.S.). Western Canadian Select traded at a discount of $11.85 to WTI ($39.80), down from a discount of $11.55. Natural gas for August lost 3.1 cents to $2.685. The TSX energy index lost 4.45 points to close at 198.53, its first time below 200 since January.

Colombia-focused Pacific Rubiales Energy Corp. (PRE) lost 15 cents to $5.25 on 3.8 million shares, on more drama surrounding its $6.50-a-share takeover offer from Alfa SAB and Harbour Energy. Shareholders have heaped so much scorn on the offer that Pacific Rubiales recently had to postpone its special meeting out of apparent fear that the offer would be decisively rejected. The main heaper is 19.8-per-cent shareholder O'Hara Administration, which told Bloomberg on Monday that Alfa and Harbour need to raise their offer to over $9 a share before O'Hara will even consider it. Although Alfa and Harbour have previously said that the offer is "full, fair and final," they may change their minds, according to a BNN story yesterday, in which a unnamed source said they are considering raising the offer but not all the way to $9. The catch, said the source to BNN, is that they will raise the offer only if they can get enough shareholder support without counting O'Hara. If not, they will just walk away after their offer is rejected at the special meeting, which was recently postponed to July 28 (a three-week delay from the original date of yesterday). All these developments led to a flurry of trading yesterday, when Pacific Rubiales closed up 11 cents to $5.40 on 10.9 million shares. This is still well below the offer price.

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