Moody’s Investors Service lowered its outlook for Russian state-controlled oil giant Rosneft due to a “significant increase” in the company’s leverage and risks associated with the integration of the newly- acquired TNK-BP International Ltd. Although Moody’s put a negative outlook on the company, they left Rosneft’s credit rating unchanged, due to close Kremlin support and… Keep reading →
Unrest in Turkey could upset Kurdish and Israeli plans to develop, and ultimately export, oil and gas respectively. [Quartz] Shareholder activism – rather, activism by select shareholders – is upsetting energy company executives’ plans to hold on to their jobs until they choose to leave. [WSJ] Competition from independent Russian gas producers, such as Novatek,… Keep reading →
Hayward steps in as interim Glencore chairman Former BP Chief Executive Tony Hayward is will serve as interim board chairman at mining behemoth Glencore Xstrata until a replacement can be found. Hayward was head of BP at the time of the Deepwater Horizon incident – a rig explosion in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010… Keep reading →
Today is the 27th anniversary of the infamous Chernobyl nuclear plant meltdown that occurred in the former Soviet republic Ukraine and humanitarian organization Green Cross International recently released the results of a study on the terrible accident’s long-term psychosocial consequences.
With any massive radiation release cancer is always a concern, but there are many other ways an event such as Chernobyl can affect local populations and the study has found roughly 10 million people suffer from permanent mental stress disorder, post-traumatic stress, depression, anxiety and stigma. Keep reading →
As politicians in Cyprus scramble to clinch a bailout deal to avert a collapse of its banking sector, Rosneft and BP finalized a deal to create the world’s largest listed oil major, an agreement Rosneft’s CEO hailed as “more important than the situation in Cyprus”.
Rosneft completed the acquisition of BP subsidiary TNK-BP on Thursday. It gives BP a near 20 percent stake in the Russian oil firm. The U.K.-listed oil giant announced Friday that it will buy back $8 billion of its shares, and return some of the proceeds to shareholders. Its stock rose 2.83 percent in morning trade on Friday. Keep reading →
The uncomfortable relationship between Russia and its biggest natural gas market – Europe – has been undergoing changes as European countries contemplate developing their indigenous shale gas resources and the divergence between oil and natural gas prices that has in turn strained the long held practice of oil-linked gas pricing outside of North America.
In this video from the recent US Association for Energy Economics conference Ariel Cohen, Heritage Foundation Senior Research Fellow discusses some of the emerging regional trends that are shaping future gas flow patterns and Russia’s role as gas supplier. Keep reading →
The potential implications of recent North American natural gas production increases stretch across the globe, with knock-on impacts for gas trading patterns, regional supply-demand balances and even geopolitics.
These were all topics of discussion at a recent plenary session held during the 31st US Association for Energy Economics North American Conference in Austin, Texas, where analysts, economists, students and government officials from the US and other countries gathered this week. Keep reading →
