CRC to Buy Berry Corp, Doubling Down on Kern County Scale

California Resources Corp. (CRC) is set to get bigger again. The Long Beach-based producer, which bought Aera Energy last year to become California’s largest oil operator, plans to acquire Dallas-based Berry Corp. in an all-stock deal valued at $717 million. Berry shareholders would receive 0.0718 CRC shares for each BRY share, a 15% premium to the Sept. 12 close. Boards on both sides approved the merger. It still needs Berry shareholder and regulatory approvals and could close in the first quarter of 2026. CRC would run the combined company from Long Beach. After the announcement, CRC rose 6% to $56.34. Berry jumped 21% to $4.01.

The deal caps a sharp turnaround for CRC. The company exited a brief 2020 bankruptcy with $5 billion of debt erased, restored profitability, and in 2024 closed its $2.1 billion all-stock purchase of Aera. Now Berry adds more scale where CRC is strongest. CEO Francisco Leon called the fit “compelling,” noting Berry’s roughly 20,000 barrels per day of Brent-linked California production and roughly 20,000 mostly adjacent net acres in Kern County. Pro forma, the combined company would have produced about 161,000 boe/d in Q2, roughly 81% oil, with additional assets in Utah’s Uinta Basin.

CRC expects $80–90 million in annual synergies, about 12% of the deal value. Savings should come from overlapping corporate functions, refinancing, operating improvements, and supply chain efficiencies, with most captured within a year of closing. Analysts said CRC’s faster-than-planned synergy delivery on Aera boosts confidence. The merger also brings Berry’s C&J Well Services, which CRC says will help keep wells online, strengthen abandonment work, and curb cost inflation.

Policy winds just shifted in Kern County. The Legislature passed SB 237 to clear a permitting backlog and allow the county to approve up to 2,000 new drilling permits a year, after only 84 were issued in 2024. CRC welcomed the move, arguing more in-state supply will stabilize fuel markets and reduce reliance on foreign barrels. Another bill, SB 614, would lift the moratorium on CO? pipelines, supporting CRC’s Carbon Terra Vault JV, which already holds a federal Class VI permit to store up to 38 million tons of CO? at Elk Hills. CRC says CO? pipelines are critical to scaling its carbon management business.

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