Category:

Chevron Unit Said to Cut Output From Saudi-Kuwaiti Oil Fields

Oil workers on a Chevron drilling platform near the Saudi Arabian border in Kuwait. Saudi Arabia, the largest producer in the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, and Kuwait, the group’s third-biggest member, will join other OPEC states to assess market conditions and production levels at a June 5 meeting in Vienna. Photographer: Joe Raedle/Getty Images (Bloomberg) — Crude production dropped 20 percent since October at a venture that a Chevron Corp. unit operates in the Wafra fields, which Kuwait is developing with Saudi Arabia, according to two people with direct knowledge of the matter. Daily output dropped to 180,000 barrels from about 200,000 barrels last month and 225,000 barrels in October, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the matter isn’t public. Two rigs are halted and more may be idled in the coming months because Saudi Arabian Chevron Inc. faces problems operating wells due to […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Iran President Says Oil-Price Drop to Hurt Saudi Arabia, Kuwait

Oil’s price slump may hurt Saudi Arabia and Kuwait more than Iran, which depends less on crude exports than the other two nations, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said. Countries responsible for the drop in oil prices will “regret it,” Rouhani said in an address in Bushehr province, without identifying them. “If Iran suffers from declining oil prices, know that other oil-producing countries such as Kuwait and Saudi Arabia will suffer more than Iran,” Rouhani said. Saudi Arabia, the world’s largest crude exporter, and neighboring Kuwait opposed Iran’s unsuccessful effort to persuade the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries to cut output at their Nov. 27 meeting. Iran ’s crude exports have been curbed by international sanctions imposed because of the country’s nuclear program. It produced 2.77 million barrels a day of oil in December, down from an average of 3.58 million in 2011, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Oil […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Age of Plenty Seen Over for Gulf Arabs as Oil Tumbles

The boom that adorned Gulf Arab monarchies with glittering towers, swelled their sovereign funds and kept unrest largely at bay may be over after oil prices dropped by almost 50 percent in the last six months. The sheikhdoms have used the oil wealth to remake their region. Landmarks include man-made islands on reclaimed land, as well as financial centers, airports and ports that turned the Arabian desert into a banking and travel hub. The money was also deployed to ward off social unrest that spread through the Middle East during the Arab Spring. “The region has had 10 years of abundance,” said Simon Williams , HSBC Holdings Plc’s chief economist for central and eastern Europe , the Middle East and North Africa. “But that decade of plenty is done. The drop in oil prices will hurt performance in the near term, even if the Gulf’s buffers are powerful enough […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Kuwait Planning $7 Billion Heavy-Oil Project Amid Cheaper Crude

Kuwait , the third-largest producer in OPEC, plans to spend about $7 billion to develop heavy-oil fields even with crude prices near five-year lows. The first phase of the Lower Fars heavy-oil project will cost $4.2 billion, with contracts to be awarded by the end of this year, Hashem Hashem, chief executive officer of state-owned Kuwait Oil Co., said today at a conference in Kuwait City. KOC, which plans to drill 900 wells and pump 60,000 barrels a day by 2018 in the project’s first phase, targets output of 180,000 barrels a day by 2025 and 270,000 by 2030, Hashem said. Production from Lower Fars and the Ratqa field “will open the door for development of other heavy oil fields in Kuwait,” he said. Brent crude , a pricing benchmark for more than half of the world’s oil, has tumbled 41 percent from its June 19 peak this year […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Kuwait Said to Deny Permits to Saudi Chevron Staff at Oil Fields

Kuwait stopped issuing work permits for Saudi Arabian Chevron Inc. employees at oil fields the Persian Gulf nations are developing jointly, according to three people with direct knowledge of the matter. Saudi Chevron, a subsidiary of Chevron Corp. (CVX) , can’t issue or renew work permits for employees at the Wafra oil fields because Kuwait’s ministry of labor and social affairs halted services to the company, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the matter isn’t public. A number of Saudi Chevron staff, including U.S. citizens, left Kuwait after their permits expired, and other foreign employees are expected to follow them, two of the people said. The Kuwaiti measures will hurt output at the Wafra oil fields located in a shared neutral zone along Saudi Arabia’s border with Kuwait, according to a letter of objection that Saudi Chevron sent to the Kuwaiti government, a copy of […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Kuwait Joins Saudi View of No Immediate OPEC Supply Cuts

Two of OPEC’s biggest members say they won’t immediately reduce oil production to offset tumbling prices, a signal the group is unlikely to heed Venezuelan calls for an emergency meeting. While producing nations would like higher prices, there’s “no room” for them to achieve that by lowering supply, Kuwait ’s oil minister told the official Kuwait News Agency yesterday. Saudi Arabia, which pumped almost one-third of the group’s output last month, won’t alter its supplies much between now and the end of the year, a person familiar with its policy said Oct. 3. “Saudi action is what matters most and we have yet to see anything,” Katherine Spector, a commodities strategist at CIBC World Markets Inc. in New York , said yesterday by phone. “There’s not a lot the Venezuelans can do, either by action or rhetoric, that will change things.” OPEC’s largest Persian Gulf producers, including Saudi Arabia, […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Kuwait Boosts Oil Output Despite Falling Prices

KUWAIT CITY—Kuwait is boosting its crude output this month despite falling prices, people familiar with the matter said Thursday. Oil prices have declined sharply over the summer, even falling below $100 a barrel this week. But members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries have been split in their response to the price drop. While Saudi Arabia cut its production by 400,000 barrels a day in August, others are boosting their oil flows. Kuwait has increased its production to 2.9 million barrels a day this month, up 100,000 barrels a day from August, the people familiar with the matter said. It could rise to 3 million barrels a day next month, one person said. The output hike is to supply a 10-year deal signed last month by Kuwait with Sinopec Corp. The contract will nearly double Kuwait’s supplies to the Chinese oil giant to 300,000 barrels a day. […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Five Kuwait politicians’ citizenship revoked

Kuwait has stripped five well-known opposition figures of their citizenship, including the owner of a newspaper and television station. The official Kuwait News Agency announced the decision by Kuwait’s cabinet on Monday, which approved a draft decree to revoke the citizenship of the five. Among those named in the decision is Abdullah al-Barghash, a former Islamist opposition legislator, and three other members of his family. The government also revoked the nationality of Ahmad al-Shemmeri, owner of the independent Al-Youm television station and Alam Al-Yawm newspaper. His newspaper was ordered temporarily shut down twice this year by a court for defying a prosecutor-ordered media blackout about an investigation into a coup plot to overthrow the Gulf monarchy’s government. The state news agency account did not give a reason for the cabinet’s decision.

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Five Kuwait politicians' citizenship revoked

Kuwait has stripped five well-known opposition figures of their citizenship, including the owner of a newspaper and television station. The official Kuwait News Agency announced the decision by Kuwait’s cabinet on Monday, which approved a draft decree to revoke the citizenship of the five. Among those named in the decision is Abdullah al-Barghash, a former Islamist opposition legislator, and three other members of his family. The government also revoked the nationality of Ahmad al-Shemmeri, owner of the independent Al-Youm television station and Alam Al-Yawm newspaper. His newspaper was ordered temporarily shut down twice this year by a court for defying a prosecutor-ordered media blackout about an investigation into a coup plot to overthrow the Gulf monarchy’s government. The state news agency account did not give a reason for the cabinet’s decision.

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Saudis to Expand Offshore Oil Field without Kuwait

Top oil exporter Saudi Arabia will go it alone in boosting the capacity of an offshore oil field in its shared neutral zone with Kuwait after the neighboring Persian Gulf state withdrew from the project due to political deadlock between parliament and the government, two people familiar with the matter said. Kuwait had initially told Khafji Joint Operations, the joint venture that oversees and develops the operations at the neutral zone, that it would participate in the Khafji offshore project, but later pulled out due to political troubles in the country, the people said. "Kuwait has several problems between its parliament and the government that are causing delays in several projects including Khafji, which is not a top priority for the government at the moment," said one person familiar with the matter. "No official wanted to make a decision on sharing the costs of the project and get questioned […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple