The wildly successful Double Eagle Energy last May set tongues wagging on news it was exploring a sale of its Permian assets that could potentially fetch $6.5 billion. Three years into its iteration as Double Eagle IV, co-founders and co-CEOs Cody Campbell and John Sellers had built one of the most coveted, privately held positions in the Midland. This, after selling Double Eagle III in 2021 to Pioneer Natural Resources for $6.4 billion.

Wall Street was quick to throw potential buyer names in the hat—those of producers inside and outside the basin. Reese Energy Consulting staff did the same. None were winners, of course. Because around this time last year, the eventual buyer of Double Eagle’s Midland assets already had its hands full with a mega merger. That would be Diamondback Energy and its $26 billion cash-and-stock deal for Endeavor Energy Resources, crowning the former third-largest Permian producer with a total 838,000 acres and 816 MBOED.

Fast-forward three months to May, tongues wagging, rumors swirling with the news Double Eagle would roll out its sales process in the last half of 2024 for the most attractive asset remaining in the Midland. The bids must’ve poured in. And then in November, the dynamic duo of Campbell and Sellers sweetened the sales pot, hitting the accelerator on production with 121 MBOED—a 177% increase from the same month a year before—growing liquids to 2.3 MMbbl—a 114% increase from the same time in 2024—and gas output rising 488% over the same period.

Whether this further piqued Diamondback’s interest, some things we’ll never know. But at some point ahead of final handshakes, someone declared a done deal.  Diamondback will pay Double Eagle $4.1 billion in cash and stock for 40,000 net acres, 27 MBOD, and 407 gross horizontal locations.