Fragments of a blog
Fragments of a blog
Germany’s export-import regulator BAFA used to break down natural gas imports by supplying country. For 2016 and 2017, BAFA provided no breakdown to avoid disclosing commercially sensitive information. For 1H2018, unexpectedly, the breakdown is back. Russia accounted for 39% of Germany’s natural gas…
President Trump claimed this at yesterday’s NATO summit: Germany is totally controlled by Russia because they will be getting from 60% to 70% of their energy from Russia and a new pipeline. I’m going to focus on the subordinate clause…
According to Bloomberg, President Trump tweeted this statement early Monday morning: Russia and China are playing the Currency Devaluation game as the U.S. keeps raising interest rates. Not acceptable! For decades, China has been intermittently accused of keeping the yuan…
This past Thursday, the US Department of the Treasury announced that John E. Smith will be leaving his position as Director of the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) in early May. Mr. Smith has served as OFAC’s Director/Acting Director…
This post is about William “Bill” Browder’s recent Senate testimony on the enforcement of the Foreign Agent Registration Act. While you don’t have to trust Browder on other issues, his testimony makes it rather likely that Fusion GPS tried to…
Good to hear about Russian entrepreneurs doing something cutting-edge and producing something immediately marketable: Amid the satellites, virtual reality headsets, 3D printers and other hi-tech products on show at Skolkovo’s recent Startup Bazaar, the stand housing a cage of buzzing…
Ronald Smith, also known as Ron Smith, Citigroup’s oil and gas analyst covering Russia and the CIS, argues in the Financial Times (if you cannot access it, try googling the title and reading Google’s cache) that Russia is likely to…
In March 2014 – right after Moscow’s Crimea operation – Christopher Helman, who covers the energy business for Forbes, wrote: So why has Exxon excelled there [in Russia]? I think it’s because Exxon has proven itself to be as hard-nosed as Putin…
If I were to respond to this piece, I’d probably make these points: Exxon has always negotiated with Moscow from a position of strength. Can you say this of the other majors with tangible Russian exposure – BP, Shell and…
In dealing with Russian authorities, Exxon has always stood out among its peers for toughness. The company has steadfastly rejected opportunities that would not put it in control of a project: it would rather stay away altogether. As a result,…
Almost two months ago, in October 2016, I wrote that Russian oil companies could reduce their daily oil output by slowing down production growth at newly launched fields and by reinvesting less in mature fields, increasing their decline rate to…
OPEC expects Russia to produce at the same average rate in 2017 as in 2016, which means a slight decrease from the current daily output. The IEA acknowledges that, if Russia can continue pumping at the same rate as in October,…