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Russia to Start Iran Crude Imports

Russia may start importing crude from Iran next week as part of an oil-for-goods agreement, Iranian Energy Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh said. “We hope that next week” Russia will take its first imports, Zanganeh told reporters on board a plane from Vienna late on Friday, after attending a meeting of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries. “Much of this will be for cash and we will be using this money to buy commodities from the Russians.” Iranian oil exports have dropped 50 percent since international sanctions against the country were tightened in 2011 amid a dispute over its nuclear program. Companies that trade with Iran are barred from doing business with U.S. and European operators. World powers including Russia and the U.S. plan to complete talks with Iran by the end of June to end the decade-long impasse over its atomic program. Zanganeh said he discussed the deal with […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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International flotilla rescues 5,900 from Mediterranean in a weekend

ROME/LONDON An international rescue fleet plucked almost 5,900 migrants from rickety boats making the perilous sea crossing for North Africa to Europe on Saturday and Sunday, Italy’s coastguard said. The British warship Bulwark assisted in picking up more than 1,000 refugees, including 10 pregnant women, the Ministry of Defense said. The Italian coastguard, which coordinates rescue efforts from Rome, said British, Swedish, Spanish and Italian ships and a merchant vessel had all been called upon to go to the aid of 15 different boats on Sunday, rescuing 2,400 people in all. On Saturday, 3,500 migrants were rescued about 45 miles from the Libyan coast. The tide of migrants and refugees risking the often deadly sea crossing to reach Europe from Africa is on the rise this year and the U.N. refugee agency estimates more than 1,800 have drowned. About 800 perished in a single shipwreck in April. In response, […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Libya’s official government says central bank now based in eastern HQ

BAYDA, Libya, June 5 Libya’s internationally recognised government says the central bank’s headquarters have moved to the eastern city of Bayda, although it was not clear how the bank would control and process payments with its staff and computers still in Tripoli. The Bayda-based government is struggling for control of big state institutions with a rival administration in Tripoli and also says it plans to route oil revenues through the east, bypassing the capital. However, foreign buyers are still paying for oil through the Tripoli-based NOC state oil firm. Libya has been engulfed by violence and chaos since Muammar Gaddafi was toppled in 2011, and in August a faction called Libya Dawn seized the capital, forcing the official premier, Abdullah al-Thinni, to flee with his ministers to the east. Ministries and state bodies in Tripoli remain under the control of Thinni’s rivals, who are boycotted by world powers. The […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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ISIS presents main threat in Libya’s civil war

MISURATA, Libya — As the Islamic State scores new victories in Syria and Iraq, its affiliate in Libya is also on the offensive, consolidating control of Moammar Gaddafi’s former home town and staging a bomb attack on a major city, Misurata. The Islamic State’s growth could further destabilize a country already suffering from a devastating civil war. And Libya could offer the extremists a new base from which to launch attacks elsewhere in North Africa. The Libyan affiliate does not occupy large amounts of territory as the Islamic State does in Syria and Iraq. But in the past few months, the local group has seized Sirte, the coastal city that was Gaddafi’s last redoubt, as well as neighborhoods in the eastern city of Derna. A key reason for the Libyan affiliate’s expansion is the chaos that has enveloped this oil-rich nation since the 2011 Arab Spring revolt. The country […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Asian shares slip, China’s imports disappoint

TOKYO Asian shares extended losses on Monday as weak Chinese imports increased concerns over a slowdown in the world’s second largest economy, while the dollar was steady after U.S. jobs data raised chances for a U.S. interest rate hike as early as September. European markets were seen opening mixed, as the specter of Greece’s financial woes still loomed over sentiment. Financial spreadbetters expected Britain’s FTSE 100 .FTSE to open up by 8-15 points, or as much as 0.2 percent higher. Germany’s DAX .GDAXI was seen falling by 11 to 27 points, or as much as 0.2 percent lower, while France’s CAC .FCHI was seen opening unchanged to down by 7 points, or as much as 0.1 percent lower. "European equities are set to start mixed this morning. Although the FTSE looks set to eke out some small gains on the open, continental markets look set to sag on fears […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Americans Buy a Fifth of China’s Exports

Americans bought almost $1 out of every $5 worth of goods that China exported in May, the highest share since August 2010. While Chinese shipments to trading partners including Japan, Europe and South Korea tumbled last month from a year ago, those to the U.S. climbed 7.8 percent. That helped make America the destination for 18.8 percent of China’s exports, outstripping all others. The European Union took 15.1 percent, with 11.9 percent for the Southeast Asian grouping of Asean. Evidence of China’s increasing reliance on the world’s largest economy comes just weeks before annual talks between the two nations in Washington, amid signs of tension over the yuan exchange rate. While the U.S. maintains that the yuan is significantly overvalued — something that would give Chinese goods a competitive edge — the International Monetary Fund disagrees . “A better U.S. economy, and a relatively larger share of trade, may […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Exxon at the crossroads: buy a rival or shrink

But the company’s focus on cash distributions to shareholders, and the fact that its oil and gas production is lower now than immediately after Exxon bought Mobil back in 1999, certainly look like evidence that it has given up on long-term revenue growth. Exxon is the world’s largest listed energy group, and like all big international oil companies it is facing structural challenges that make it difficult for it to grow. Stability while throwing off a lot of cash may be the best they can do. Critical strategic question Rex Tillerson, now in his tenth year as chief executive, faces a critical strategic question. Does Exxon accept that fate, curbing capital spending and returning cash to investors whenever possible? Or does it attempt to break out by making a large acquisition ? The decline in Exxon’s number of shares outstanding has been dramatic. In 1999, the newly merged company […]

Posted On : Published By : ASPO-USA
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Exxon to Face Regulators’ Questions Over Quakes

Texas regulators are scrutinizing some of the biggest U.S. energy producers in the wake of several earthquakes that have rocked the Dallas-Fort Worth area. An Exxon Mobil Corp. XOM 0.07 % subsidiary and EOG Resources Inc., EOG 2.63 % one of the biggest shale-oil and gas pumpers, are facing questions about their use of injection wells to dispose of wastewater from hydraulic fracturing operations. The state’s oil-and-gas regulator on Wednesday begins a series of hearings in Austin to assess some oil companies’ role in causing the temblors. A growing body of scientific research from federal, state and academic researchers suggests that disposal wells, often used to get rid of the dirty water leftover from fracking and brine from oil-and-gas production, may be linked to increased seismic activity. Some in the energy industry are trying to discount those studies. The commission’s seismologist, Craig Pearson, has also expressed doubts that fracking […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Day After EPA Finds Fracking Does Not Pollute Water, Top Oil Regulator Resigns Over Water Contamination

Put this one in the awkward file: just hours after the EPA released yet another massive study (literally, at just under 1000 pages ) which found no evidence that fracking led to widespread pollution of drinking water (an outcome welcome by the oil industry and its backers and criticized by environmental groups), the director of the California Department of Conservation, which oversees the agency that regulates the state’s oil and gas industry, resigned as the culmination of a scandal over the contamination of California’s water supply by fracking wastewater dumping. An aerial view of pits containing production water from oil wells near California 33 and Lokern Road in Kern County This is what the allegedly impartial EPA said on Thursday when it released its long awaited study: “ we did not find evidence that [hydraulic fracking has] led to widespread, systemic impacts on drinking water resources in the United […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Exxon at the crossroads: buy a rival or shrink

But the company’s focus on cash distributions to shareholders, and the fact that its oil and gas production is lower now than immediately after Exxon bought Mobil back in 1999, certainly look like evidence that it has given up on long-term revenue growth. Exxon is the world’s largest listed energy group, and like all big international oil companies it is facing structural challenges that make it difficult for it to grow. Stability while throwing off a lot of cash may be the best they can do. Critical strategic question Rex Tillerson, now in his tenth year as chief executive, faces a critical strategic question. Does Exxon accept that fate, curbing capital spending and returning cash to investors whenever possible? Or does it attempt to break out by making a large acquisition ? The decline in Exxon’s number of shares outstanding has been dramatic. In 1999, the newly merged company […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple