<figure style=“padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 14px; border-collapse: collapse; display: block;”><figcaption style=“padding: 0px; margin: 0px; border-collapse: collapse; color: rgb(102, 102, 102); display: block; font-size: 12px;”>BP chief executive Bob Dudley: rumored to be set to announce deal with Russians. Photograph: Toby Melville / Reuters/REUTERS[FONT=arial]BP last night unveiled a risky gamble to build a new future for itself in the Russian Arctic by agreeing an $18bn exchange of shares with the Kremlin’s favourite oil company.
The deal to transfer 5% of BP ownership to Rosneft immediately came under attack in America – currently its most important market – with one senator describing BP as "Bolshoi Petroleum."
The tie-up, which also gives BP a 9% stake in Rosneft, will also be controversial because the two companies are to concentrate on developing reserves in the pristine waters of the Russian Arctic.
BP is having to look east after a damaging run of accidents in the US, most notably the Deepwater Horizon disaster for which it has been bitterly criticised for lapse standards.
Bob Dudley, the new BP chief executive brought in to clean up the business after the Gulf fiasco, said the move was “not any reaction to anything happening in the US.”
</figcaption></figure>[/FONT]
Here’s another article, same story. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-12195576
Never paid much attention to the offshore world until I ran into gCaptain. Damn, this stuff is getting interesting.