Gazprom Neft Seeks to Expand Overseas
July 12th, 2008
As reported by The Silk Road Intelligencer, Gazprom Neft – a subsidiary of Russian natural gas monopoly Gazprom – had initiated talks to acquire a 49 percent stake in Mangistaumunaigas (MMG), a Kazakh oil company, according to Russian media. As the article notes: “…The deal is a part of Gazprom Neft’s strategy to expand overseas […]
Read more »Caspian Pipeline Politics: Gazprom’s Monopolistic Actions Backfiring
July 7th, 2008
 As we have discussed many times previously, the existing pipeline architecture of Central Asia represents the regional imperialism of Cold War Russia, despite Turkmen and Kazakh flirtations with new Trans-Caspian pipeline projects to Azerbaijan to circumvent the Russian control over exports to Western Europe. A recent article by Robert M. Cutler of Carleton University in […]
Read more »Modern Day Silk Road
June 26th, 2008
As reported by New Eurasia.net, a new Silk Road seems to be in the offing. The article notes: “…[World Bank President] Bob Zoellick used his three-day trip to Kazakhstan to announce a $2.5 billion infrastructure project together with Prime Minister Massimov. A trade corridor linking China and Europe by road has long been in the […]
Read more »Taking Stock in Kazakhstan
June 20th, 2008
A recent report by Business News Europe examines the growth of the Kazakhstan Stock Exchange (KASE) – the most developed in Central Asia – and the uphill struggle it now faces over Kazakhstan’s highly attractive pipeline of IPOs due to intense competition from foreign exchanges. As the article notes: “…Kazakhstan’s largest companies typically choose to […]
Read more »The Next Frontier?
June 18th, 2008
An interesting article in Smart Money (subscription required for online version), discussing The Next Frontier. As the article notes: “…finding investing opportunities sheltered from the fits and starts of the global economy requires going off the grid. Way off, in fact. Countries like Nigeria, Kazakhstan and Qatar are developing tradable markets, prompting adventurous investors to […]
Read more »A Knot of Pipeline Projects/Proposals: The Caspian Conundrum
June 13th, 2008
Via Radio Free Europe, an insightful look at the multitude of Caspian pipeline projects that leaders of the Caspian Sea littoral states — Azerbaijan, Russia, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, and Iran — and others such as the EU and U.S. are discussing, debating, funding, and developing. As the article notes: “…we are in the middle of a […]
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.