C it go — Chavez’s Petrocracy Scales Back Profits at Citgo
November 16th, 2007
A very interesting WSJ article on Citgo – which Venezuela bought two decades ago to market its hard-to-refine heavy oil – changing its focus to feed cash to President Chávez’s social programs in Venezuela.  As the article notes: “…while other U.S. refiners have invested heavily to take advantage of historically wide profit margins in the […]
Read more »Petróleos de Venezuela S.A. – A Study in Petrocracy
November 6th, 2007
I strongly recommend a terrific article by Tina Rosenberg in the New York Times magazine which describes the unexploited promise – and many problems – associated with Petróleos de Venezuela S.A. (Pdvsa) under the current Venezuelan political regime in particular and nationalized oil in general. As the article notes: “…77 percent of the world’s oil […]
Read more »Venezuela and China Increase Ties
September 13th, 2007
Today’s Energy Daily reports that Venezuela and China are expanding their oil ties, with their respective state petroleum companies stating that they will spend more than $10 billion to develop the oil-rich Faja del Orinoco region. President Hugo Chavez also said earlier this week Venezuelan state-owned energy firm PDVSA would collaborate with China National Petroleum […]
Read more »Petrobras – No Longer a Petrosaurus
August 30th, 2007
An excellent article in today’s WSJ on Petrobras, one of the New Seven Sisters. I highly recommend a complete read, but of particular note was the following: “…Today, Petrobras boasts more crude reserves than Chevron Corp., lower costs of finding oil than Exxon Mobil Corp., and a listing on the New York Stock Exchange — […]
Read more »An OPEC for Natural Gas: Born in South America?
August 26th, 2007
As noted in Xinhua earlier this month, Bolivia, Argentina and Venezuela signed an accord to create the Organization of Gas Producing and Exporting Countries of South America (Opegasur), which is aimed at consolidating their energy alliance. “…The three presidents inked the commitment memorandum for the exploration and exploitation of fossil fuels in the Bolivian provinces […]
Read more »Chavez’s Into Africa Tour…
August 24th, 2007
Several interesting tidbits from this Energy Daily analysis, namely, Chavez’s continued engagement with African oil-rich nations and PDVSA’s plan to create its own equipment/services division to help address declining production resulting from equipment shortages. It is not clear how Venezuela can balance their equipment shortfalls at home while pursuing an ambitious international growth plan, but […]
Read more »Focusing primarily on The New Seven Sisters - the largely state owned petroleum companies from the emerging world that have become key players in the oil & gas industry as identified by Carola Hoyos, Chief Energy Correspondent for The Financial Times - but spanning other nascent opportunities around the globe that may hold potential in the years ahead, Wildcats & Black Sheep is a place for the adventurous to contemplate & evaluate the emerging markets of tomorrow.