It was announced today that Butte’s main supplier of natural gas and electric utility NorthWestern Energy is being purchased by Babcock & Brown Infrastructure – based in Sydney, Australia. NorthWestern is the largest natural gas and electric utility in the state of Montana and purchased the Montana Power Company a few years back.

Babcock & Brown is purchasing Northwestern for $37/share (about $2.2 billion). It should be noted that the company’s stock closed at just over $32/share today.

Mike Hanson, NorthWestern’s president/C-E-O, says that they chose Babcock & Brown because it was a good value for NWE’s shareholders. Babcock & Brown plan to manage the utility on a long-term basis, and expect to keep the current NorthWestern employees in place. Before any of the final paperwork can take place, the deal has to be approved by shareholders and regulators. Greg Jergeson, the Public Service Commission Chairman says that the commission doesn’t know much about the new company as of yet.

Informational Source: Associated Press of Helena

-Delaney & Marx