Posted on 11/04/2009 8:49:53 AM PST by NormsRevenge
OSLO (AFP) Norwegian energy group Statoil said Wednesday it was selling some of its US offshore oil assets to China's state-owned CNOOC, marking the first step by a Chinese energy major into the US market.
The sale, announced along with Statoil's quarterly results, involves a limited stake for the China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) in four exploitation licences for deepwater blocks bought in 2007 and 2008.
"On 29 October Statoil signed a farm down agreement with the Chinese company CNOOC involving a number of Statoil's leases in the Gulf of Mexico," Statoil said in its third-quarter earnings statement.
Statoil, which is 67 percent state-owned, declined to disclose the value of the transaction but spokesman Kai Nielsen told AFP that the size of the deal was "very small."
In 2005, CNOOC had to cancel an 18.5-billion-dollar (12.4-billion-euro) deal with US firm Unocal because the politics of a communist country buying key US assets proved too controversial for Capitol Hill.
"It came to signify the general struggle between the US and China," Kurt Barrow, a senior partner at energy consulting firm Purvin and Gertz in Singapore, told AFP at the time.
"CNOOC may have lost the battle but it will not give up the war," Barrow added, ..
The sale announced Wednesday took place in the context of a slowdown in offshore oil exploration caused by the global credit crunch, an environment in which "opposition to Chinese investment may be less likely," the Wall Street Journal said last month.
CNOOC will be acquiring 20 percent of the Tucker prospect and a 10-percent stake on the licences of the Krakatoa, Cobra and Logan blocks, while Statoil will remain the operator of all four blocks.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
fyi
Got Oil?
Helge Lund, CEO of Norwegian energy group Statoil, speaks at a press conference in Oslo, November 4. Norwegian energy group Statoil said Wednesday it was selling some of its US offshore oil assets to China's state-owned CNOOC, marking the first step by a Chinese energy major into the US market. (AFP/Scanpix/Lise Aserud)
This can’t be good....
It is beyond foolishness to trust a belligerent, totalitarian state in such a manner.
Howdy Norm!
I’m feeling very dense this morning. Can you possibly ‘splain this article? Are we selling US oil to Norway so they can sell it to China?
It’s mindnumbing.............
or maybe it’s just the foggy morning.
Since crude oil prices are affected by world wide supply and demand their activity could lower the price of gasoline in the US.
For those of us who drive everyday this can be a win win deal because the 0bama energy policy is out chasing green butterflies.
They’re are selling oil tract leases is how I read it ..
It’s sunny here, supposed to cool down a bit and get wet soon too..
We’ve had gloriously sunny weather for about a week now. Today the gloomy fog moved in.
LukOil and Gazprom, the russian energy firms, already have a presense here in America. If my information is correct, the Rushkies own a partial share in BP as well.
The Chinese only want a piece of the action.
We would sell Midwestern farmland to the Russians so they can produce their own wheat...
Now we know why we aren’t allowed to drill for our own oil. Obama and congress sold it to other Countries.
But I would bet this is also a way to get a few Chinese intelligence agents into the US energy industry to gather intel on our drilling technology and general information about events in places like Texas and Louisiana. So that activity has to be watched by the FBI along with all the other Chinese business people sending intel on America back to China (most of it not especially useful to China.)
They mean, "leases".
Stupid Frogs.
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