Chinese state oil firms preparing bid for Petro-Tech Peruana’s offshore oil assets

AFX Financial News — August 13, 2008

“Chinese state oil firms are readying bids for Petro-Tech Peruana, a privately held oil company with offshore assets in Peru which could fetch $1.5-2.5 billion, sources with knowledge of the situation said.

Several sources said Petro-Tech, which is owned by the private U.S. firm Offshore International Group, was up for sale and several Chinese companies were looking at it, with oil giant CNPC and offshore specialist CNOOC Ltd. potential bidders.

CNPC is the parent of PetroChina”

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Chile-Australia Sign Free Trade Agreement

Chile is once again paving the “Free Trade Agreement” road in South America, cementing yet another strategic Free Trade Agreement with Australia.

Chile and more recently Peru, are beginning to realize their positions along the Pacific Coast of South America is growing into a geographic blessing with the rise of Asia. Australia, which is both a very important economy in the Pacific region of Asia is also similar to Chile on many levels. Both have vibrant commodity sectors, and both are increasingly more involved with the Asian economies.

Chilean Foreign Minister Alejandro Foxley explained, “We are going to sign a Free Trade Agreement with a country that is very similar to ours because the message is that we don’t really want to compete, but would rather like to join forces.”

“The reason is obvious; we are both looking towards the Asian-Pacific region. We have free trade agreements with all of the Asian countries and we don’t have the capacity to provide on our own the supply levels of this expanding market” he added.

All in all a good decision for both parties whom hope trade cooperation will place the two nations in better positions to compete with Asia in areas outside of commodities.

Click here to access a more detailed article on this topic from MercoPress

Chile’s other trade agreements within the Pacific region include (I might miss a couple and if so by all means let me know):

— Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership: Chile, New Zealand, Singapore, Brunei

— Bilateral agreements between Chile and the countries of: Canada, El Salvador, Cosa Rica, South Korea, the People’s Republic of China, Panama, Japan, Mexico, the United States and New Zealand.

— FTA’s are also under negotiation (or unratified as of now) with the countries of Guatemala, Nicaragua, Honduras (unratified), Peru (unratified) and Colombia (unratified).

— Looking down the line Chile has plans to begin negociations with India and Thailand, two more major economies in the Pacific.

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Souh-South Cooperation: Ecuador and Chile join forces to explore for gas in Guayaguil Gulf

“The board of Petroecuador has accepted the proposal for a new joint company with ENAP”, said Mines and Petroleum minister Galo Chiriboga in Quito.

The minister added that the new joint company will “boost gas exploration in the gulf of Guayaquil”, to the southwest of Ecuador where primary surveys have indicated the possibility of significant natural gas deposits.

Petroecuador is also involved in a similar undertaking with Venezuela’s PDVSA, with the purpose of searching for gas in an adjacent area in the gulf.

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Click here to access the full story from MercoPress

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Peru — Set to achieve highest economic growth in the region in 2008/09 reports the IDB

The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) data and reports show that Peru’s GDP growth expectations rose from 7.8 to 8.3% in 2008, which makes Peru according to IDB calculations the country with the higest growth in the region for 2008.

Second for 2009, the IDB estimates Peru’s GDP growth will be around 7% in 2009. If this holds, Peru will also achieve the highest growth in the region in 2009, but as always time will have to tell. With the current volatility in the global economy things may well change, especially considering Peru’s over-dependence on certain key exports like Copper and Gold — both of which have serverely retracted in price as of recent.

IDB growth calculations for other economies in the region for 2008 where as follows:

Uraguay … 6.8%
Bolivia … 4.78%
Argentina … 7.2%
Chile … 3.9%
Mexico … 2.63%
Brazil … (2008 not yet available by IDB)

Lets go Peru! Now lets see if Peruvian leadership will be able to show and actually convince the millions of poor people around its territory this strong growth will eventually bring them a better life.

A life with opportunities and all the other “nice,” things the Peruvian’s who shop here enjoy–>

Larcomar, Miraflores – Lima, Peru

But which the millions of people who live here, severely lack –>

Pueblo Joven (shanty town) in Lima, Peru

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Copper, Oil Lead Decline as Global Growth Slows reports Bloomberg LP

Aug. 8 (Bloomberg) — Copper and crude oil led a decline in commodities on concern that slower global economic growth will curb demand for raw materials.

Copper headed for its biggest weekly drop since March, crude oil fell to the lowest compared with closing prices since May and silver reached its cheapest since January. Italy’s second-quarter gross domestic product unexpectedly shrank, the statistics office in Rome said today. Japan’s economy probably contracted in the three months ended June, according to the median estimate of 25 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News.

“People understand that we might face a difficult two or three quarters ahead of us,” said Christoph Eibl, who helps manage more than $1 billion of commodities at Tiberius Asset Management AG in Zug, Switzerland. “Industrial-related commodities will not outperform.”

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Click here to access the full story from Bloomberg LP

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Chinese stocks drop most in 6 weeks ahead of Opening Ceremony of Olympic Games

Zhang Shidong and Dingmin Zhang of Bloomberg LP report Chinese stocks have plunged ahead of the Olympic Games due to what analysts and investors say was a failure on the part of the Chinese Government to announce “market stablalizing” measures ahead of the games.

A great deal can change in China in just a months time. Considering the last time I visited was back in Sept-Dec of 2006, I’m sure a great deal has evolved. One thing, no matter the time difference in which people visited China or more particularly Beijing that seemed to remain with time was hope that the games would boost Chinese equities.

This has been a good lesson to avoid heading into markets with the “herd” or in laymen terms… the masses.

Beijing definetly has a boom town feel, but so do other cities in China. Other places, such as Shaang Xi province, a coal producing region do not (or did not back in 2006). Chinese people from Southern Economic Zones created in the late 90’s and other regions which have grown rapidly over the past decade expressed concern the country was spending too much on the games to me.

One young man of 20 years from Guang Zhou, a Cantonese speaking region ajacent to Hong Kong told me “Beijing has the boom but is only able to back it up becuase of the government. Places like Shanghai and Shenzhen are boom towns but can back the talk and boom.”

He may be right, as Olympic spectators are dazzled in the capital, they are seeing quite a show… trust me it will be a show when the games opening ceremony comes on TV at 8am (Eastern Standard Time).

The boom feeling in China is real, but not substantial enough to defy slumping global equities. The Shanghai Stock Exchange has grown 7 fold in the past 2-3 years. With the global credit crises, there is no mystery as to why China and other boom markets like Vietnam and India are plunging.

This will be a good lesson to the thousands of investors picking stocks based off lucky numbers and the belief that their investments can only grow. US investors are still learning this despite being from a country with long established financial markets.

When I was born in the mid 80’s, Stock Exchanges did not even exist in China. Now that they do, both independent and institutional investors in China must learn to ride the bad times. Learn how ot depend on an income flow from investments. Learn how to not hit or yell sell when things drop. Learn how to properly evaluate equities, instead of using lucky numbers of other ways to pick stocks.

The list goes on… in Chinese Bear Markets 101.

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Disappear for 12 days and things go a bit crazy… falling Metals drag down LATAM financials —

Latin American stock markets plunged Monday, led by a slide in Brazilian and Mexican equities as prices for resources sparked a broad sell-off and growing fears about the performance of the US economy. Brazil and Mexico markets fell to their lowest level in seven and six months, while in Argentina the Merval ended at a two year record low.

In Sao Paulo, the Bovespa dropped 3.5% to 55,609.07, its third consecutive decline. Shares of the market’s heaviest-weighted stock, oil giant Petrobras tumbled 4.7%. Something similar happened with Companhia Vale do Rio Doce, the world’s leading iron ore mining giant which slid 7.2%.

Click here to access the full article from Merco Press

More comprehensive updates and analysis of past weeks events and where things may be heading to come. Need to play catch up with the world after 12 days in Brazil, with limited net, tv and media I could read (my Portuguese is not the greatest)

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