China: A Bull in Iran’s Oil “Shop”
December 10th, 2007
As reported in The Financial Times, Iran signed a $2bn oil contract with Sinopec of China, sending a signal to western companies that they might miss out on potentially lucrative contracts with one of the world’s biggest energy exporters if they continued to heed US-led sanctions against Tehran. As the article notes: “…The contract to […]
Read more »Mr. Li, I Presume?
December 6th, 2007
Via TerraDaily, an article on China’s active engagement of the Democratic Republic of Congo, a troubled nation with huge but largely untapped natural resources such as 34 percent of the world’s known cobalt reserves, 10 percent of its copper, vast forests full of timber and a treasure trove of gold and diamonds. This is just […]
Read more »Turkmenistan’s High Stakes Poker Game Upon Which Many Promises Have Been Made
December 6th, 2007
From Eurasianet.org, a terrific look at Turkmenistan’s delicate balance of making promises to various regional hydrocarbon players, all without the benefit of a published, independent audit of the nation’s petroleum reserves. As the article notes: “…Turkmenistan is believed to be one of the top five nations in the world, in terms of natural gas reserves. […]
Read more »China’s Growing Influence in Kazakhstan
December 6th, 2007
As noted in the Eurasia Daily Monitor, Kazakhstan – despite its efforts to symbolically broaden its foreign policy with recent Presidential visits to places such as Syria, UAE, and the Balkans – and investments such as KazMunayGaz’s recent acquisition of a 75% stake in Romania’s Rompetrol Group, the Balkan pipeline route and East European markets […]
Read more »Turkmenistan: Balancing China, Russia, and Europe
November 29th, 2007
As cogently analyzed by Stratfor (subscription required), Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdimukhammedov’s recent announcement that a pipeline supplying Russia with natural gas from Turkmenistan would be upgraded may just be another effort by the Turkmen leader to string Russia along — for as long as he can — until a better option, most likely China, comes […]
Read more »Afghanistan “Cops Out” to China
November 28th, 2007
From Radio Free Europe, news that Afghanistan has awarded China’s state-owned China Metallurgical Group with the right to develop a large copper field to the south of Kabul, following two years of bidding. According to the article, CMG agreed to invest billions of dollars in the project and related infrastructure development — including the construction […]
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.