Standard Chartered has emerged as sole financial adviser to BP on the sale of $7bn (€5.4bn) of assets to a US rival, less than a year after the emerging markets-focused bank hired the former head of UK mergers and acquisitions at Merrill Lynch to run its global oil and gas business.

In a major coup for the UK bank, Standard Chartered is advising BP on the sale of its oil and gas operations, acreage and infrastructure in the Permian Basin of West Texas and New Mexico and Egypt's Western Desert to Apache, a US oil and gas producer, according to a statement. Apache will also acquire all of BP's upstream natural gas business in western Alberta and British Columbia, Canada.