Business briefs 2/18: Oil prices leap higher on Nigerian unrest
Saturday, February 18, 2006
VIENNA, Austria — Oil prices jumped more than $1 Friday and settled near $60 a barrel on supply concerns caused by a rebel leader in Nigeria who threatened to wage war on foreign oil interests.
Light sweet crude for March delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange rose $1.42 to close at $59.88 a barrel.
Nymex gasoline futures surged by 9.02 cents to end at $1.5026 a gallon. Natural gas advanced by 4.8 cents to settle at $7.182 per 1,000 cubic feet.
A rebel leader, Godswill Tamuno, told the British Broadcasting Corp. that his “Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta” had warned oil companies and their employees to leave the delta before midnight Friday.
The militant group recently attacked two pipelines, which led the market to worry about supplies.
Nigeria, with daily exports of 2.5 million barrels, is Africa’s leading oil producer. It is also the fifth-biggest source of U.S. oil imports.
Senate approves nominees to the Fed
WASHINGTON — President Bush’s nominations of Randall Kroszner and Kevin Warsh to terms on the Federal Reserve board of governors won Senate approval on Friday.
Both men were approved by voice vote as was Edward Lazear, nominated by Bush to be the new chairman of the three-member White House Council of Economic Advisers.
The selections of Kroszner, an economics professor at the University of Chicago, and Warsh, an economic assistant to Bush at the White House, will bring the Fed’s seven-member board up to full strength.
The two join Ben Bernanke, who took over on Feb. 1 as the new Fed chairman, succeeding Alan Greenspan, as the most recent additions to the Fed board.
Lazear, a business professor at Stanford University, will take the Council of Economic Advisers post held by Bernanke before he succeeded Greenspan at the Fed.
Icahn reported backing down from Time Warner
NEW YORK — Financier Carl Icahn is scaling back his drive to shake up Time Warner Inc., and apparently abandoning efforts to seek control of the giant media company, The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday.
The newspaper, citing unnamed people familiar with Icahn’s plans, said Icahn would nominate only five directors at Time Warner’s next annual meeting, not enough to ensure control, amid signs that the dissident investor could be near some kind of an agreement with the company.
Icahn is allied with a group of investors who collectively own slightly more than 3 percent of Time Warner’s stock. Last week the investment bank Lazard Ltd. released a report Icahn had commissioned calling for the breakup of Time Warner into four separate entities.
China, Iran near plans to develop oil field
SHANGHAI, China — China and Iran are close to setting plans to develop Iran’s Yadavaran oil field, according to published reports, a multibillion-dollar deal that comes as Tehran faces the prospect of sanctions over its nuclear program.
The deal is thought potentially to be worth about $100 billion.
According to Caijing, a respected financial magazine, a Chinese government delegation is due to visit Iran as early as March to formally sign an agreement allowing China Petrochemical Corp., also known as Sinopec, to develop Yadavaran.
The Wall Street Journal also reported in Friday’s editions that the two sides are trying to conclude the deal in coming weeks before potential sanctions are imposed on Iran for its nuclear ambitions. The report cited unnamed Iranian oil ministry officials familiar with the talks.
In exchange for developing Yadavaran, one of Iran’s largest onshore oil fields, China would agree to buy 10 million tons of liquefied natural gas a year for 25 years beginning in 2009, the Caijing report said, citing Sinopec board member Mou Shuling.
— From news wires
VIENNA, Austria — Oil prices jumped more than $1 Friday and settled near $60 a barrel on supply concerns caused by a rebel leader in Nigeria who threatened to wage war on foreign oil interests.
Light sweet crude for March delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange rose $1.42 to close at $59.88 a barrel.
Nymex gasoline futures surged by 9.02 cents to end at $1.5026 a gallon. Natural gas advanced by 4.8 cents to settle at $7.182 per 1,000 cubic feet.
A rebel leader, Godswill Tamuno, told the British Broadcasting Corp. that his “Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta” had warned oil companies and their employees to leave the delta before midnight Friday.
The militant group recently attacked two pipelines, which led the market to worry about supplies.
Nigeria, with daily exports of 2.5 million barrels, is Africa’s leading oil producer. It is also the fifth-biggest source of U.S. oil imports.
Senate approves nominees to the Fed
WASHINGTON — President Bush’s nominations of Randall Kroszner and Kevin Warsh to terms on the Federal Reserve board of governors won Senate approval on Friday.
Both men were approved by voice vote as was Edward Lazear, nominated by Bush to be the new chairman of the three-member White House Council of Economic Advisers.
The selections of Kroszner, an economics professor at the University of Chicago, and Warsh, an economic assistant to Bush at the White House, will bring the Fed’s seven-member board up to full strength.
The two join Ben Bernanke, who took over on Feb. 1 as the new Fed chairman, succeeding Alan Greenspan, as the most recent additions to the Fed board.
Lazear, a business professor at Stanford University, will take the Council of Economic Advisers post held by Bernanke before he succeeded Greenspan at the Fed.
Icahn reported backing down from Time Warner
NEW YORK — Financier Carl Icahn is scaling back his drive to shake up Time Warner Inc., and apparently abandoning efforts to seek control of the giant media company, The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday.
The newspaper, citing unnamed people familiar with Icahn’s plans, said Icahn would nominate only five directors at Time Warner’s next annual meeting, not enough to ensure control, amid signs that the dissident investor could be near some kind of an agreement with the company.
Icahn is allied with a group of investors who collectively own slightly more than 3 percent of Time Warner’s stock. Last week the investment bank Lazard Ltd. released a report Icahn had commissioned calling for the breakup of Time Warner into four separate entities.
China, Iran near plans to develop oil field
SHANGHAI, China — China and Iran are close to setting plans to develop Iran’s Yadavaran oil field, according to published reports, a multibillion-dollar deal that comes as Tehran faces the prospect of sanctions over its nuclear program.
The deal is thought potentially to be worth about $100 billion.
According to Caijing, a respected financial magazine, a Chinese government delegation is due to visit Iran as early as March to formally sign an agreement allowing China Petrochemical Corp., also known as Sinopec, to develop Yadavaran.
The Wall Street Journal also reported in Friday’s editions that the two sides are trying to conclude the deal in coming weeks before potential sanctions are imposed on Iran for its nuclear ambitions. The report cited unnamed Iranian oil ministry officials familiar with the talks.
In exchange for developing Yadavaran, one of Iran’s largest onshore oil fields, China would agree to buy 10 million tons of liquefied natural gas a year for 25 years beginning in 2009, the Caijing report said, citing Sinopec board member Mou Shuling.
— From news wires
posted by SmartYInvestor at 2:38 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home