New frontiers driving oil/gas asset deals -study

* Chinese oil companies expanded in Americas in 2010

* Canadian oil sands deals triple, tight gas deals double

SAN FRANCISCO Jan 3 (Reuters) - A push by state oil companies to secure resources and a surge in "unconventional" hydrocarbon investments drove oil and gas asset acquisitions to a new worldwide record in 2010, a report out on Monday said.

There was a near doubling of asset deals focused on tight gas last year, while the value of transactions involving the Canadian oil sands more than tripled, according to preliminary results from the IHS Herold 2011 Global Upstream M&A Review.

A big theme was the emergence of Latin America, where total deal value soared to $29 billion, fueled by Chinese companies such as CNOOC (0883.HK: Quote) and Sinopec Corp (0386.HK: Quote) expanding their footprints in the Americas, IHS said.

Worldwide transactions involving "upstream" oil and gas assets reached a record $107 billion in 2010, representing a 160 percent increase above the figure for 2009, IHS reported.

Asset transaction values more than doubled to $59 billion in North America, dominated by shale resource investment.

"Continued low North American natural gas prices provided attractive opportunities for well-financed new entrants to invest in shale and tight sands plays," said Christopher Sheehan, IHS's director of M&A research.

He said the sustained strength in oil prices also underpinned the overall growth in deals, along with the quality of assets on offer thanks to restructurings by BP Plc (BP.L: Quote), ConocoPhillips (COP.N: Quote), Suncor Energy Inc (SU.TO: Quote) and Devon Energy Corp. (DVN.N: Quote)

In the Asia-Pacific region, the total value of transactions more than tripled to $18 billion, while activity was flat or lower in Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and the former Soviet Union, the report found. (Reporting by Braden Reddall, editing by Matthew Lewis)