Paying More for Less: Inventory Scarcity and the New Upstream Valuation Floor

U.S. upstream M&A value hit a multi-year low in 2Q26. The bid for inventory didn't. See where pricing is actually moving, basin by basin.

Get The Deal-by-Deal Breakdown

Deal value dropped to $9.1B this quarter, but that number hides the real story. Tier-one Permian acreage just reset at record prices. ABS buyers are now the marginal bid across the Mid-Continent. Eagle Ford is catching a new wave of sellers. This brief breaks down what’s driving pricing across all five major U.S. plays, and what it means for evaluating operators, portfolio positions, and where the next deals will surface. 

What’s Inside 

  • Basin-by-basin pricing signals across the Permian, Anadarko/Mid-Con, Eagle Ford, Gulf of Mexico, and Haynesville
  • The record-setting deals resetting the valuation floor for private operators, including the $1.3B Paloma sale and the BLM’s record New Mexico lease auction
  • How ABS capital is reshaping the bid for production-heavy assets, and where that capital moves next 
  • The top 5 U.S. upstream deals of 2Q26, with buyer, seller, region, and value 
  • The Enverus Intelligence® Research team’s 2H26 outlook: where deal flow is expected to accelerate next 

Andrew Dittmar

Andrew Dittmar

Principal Analyst, Enverus Intelligence® Research

Andrew is a principal analyst in Enverus Intelligence Research with a focus on M&A. He specializes in deal analysis, research and valuations for energy transactions and tracks industry M&A trends and outlooks across the energy space. He has been with Enverus for over ten years after earning finance and law degrees.

Enverus Intelligence® | Research, Inc. (EIR) is a subsidiary of Enverus that publishes energy-sector research focused on the oil, natural gas, power and renewable industries. EIR publishes reports including asset and company valuations, resource assessments, technical evaluations, and macro-economic forecasts and helps make intelligent connections for energy industry participants, service companies, and capital providers worldwide. See additional disclosures here.

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