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Gold/Mining/Energy : Strictly: Drilling and oil-field services -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: SliderOnTheBlack who wrote (34659)	1/9/1999 11:13:00 PM
From: parcival	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 95453

slider, you may not want to consider this advice but your "nemesis" Lucretius T. is the NE expert. eom

To: SliderOnTheBlack who wrote (34659)	1/10/1999 4:49:00 AM
From: davedb	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 95453

Slider, I have been a stealth member on the site for awhile. I started loading up on OS stocks and the insight is great. What do you make of this. Dave Last Updated 2:55 AM ET January 10 Track Your Favorite News Topics with Excite's NewsTracker New! Excite's NewsPhoto Gallery Iran Asks Caspian Pipeline Consortium For New Bid DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (Reuters) - Iran has asked a consortium of Chinese companies and a local firm that was tipped to win a $400 million deal to build a Caspian Sea oil pipeline to present a new bid, an Iranian oil official said Sunday. The official said the state-owned China National Petroleum Corporation and the China Petrochemical Corporation (Sinopec) and the Iranian firm MAPNA were given a deadline which closes at the end of next week to submit the bid on the pipeline to Iran's northern refineries. "I don't think they will submit new bids. I think the Chinese will be out of it (the competition)," the official, who requested anonymity, told Reuters. He said MAPNA was the lowest bidder and had been chosen to build the pipeline and then the two Chinese concerns expressed a strong interest in the project and formed a consortium with the local company. Industry sources had expected the Chinese companies to win the contract, beating about 12 competitors including Italian, British, German, Russian, South Korean and Saudi companies. Iran launched a tender earlier this year for the 390 km (240 mile), 370,000 barrels per day route from the Caspian port of Neka on a build-operate-transfer basis. The tender closed on September 6. Technical bids were opened in November and financing bids in early December. The Iranian oil official said the deal would be worth between $400 million and $500 million. He said project officials would consult the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) management on what course of action to take if the Chinese firms failed to meet the deadline. The work includes constructing three associated pumping stations and storage and blending facilities in Tehran and Tabriz. Iran is hoping to become a major export route for Caspian oil and gas, an ambition opposed by the United States. The pipeline is aimed at bringing crude from Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan for use at Tehran and Tabriz refineries. This would be in exchange for Iranian crude from the southern fields being delivered to Turkmen and Kazakh customers calling at Gulf terminals

To: SliderOnTheBlack who wrote (34659)	1/10/1999 9:54:00 AM
From: William Partmann	Respond to of 95453

Slider: NE recently announced they would acquire another driller within the next 18 months. While this does preclude a buyout, my take on the company is they plan to be a major player in deep-water for years to come. Noble Drilling Seeks to Buy Drilling Company: Bloomberg Forum Houston, Dec. 22 (Bloomberg) -- Noble Drilling Corp., the seventh-largest U.S. oil-drilling contractor, wants to buy another drilling company in 18 months to help it compete for business as its customers, oil companies, consolidate. Noble has had preliminary discussions with other rig companies about acquisitions, Noble Chief Executive James Day told the Bloomberg Forum. Day said proposed combinations of larger oil companies will cut demand for drilling rigs next year as the merged entities reorganize spending programs. Exxon Corp.'s proposed acquisition of Mobil Corp. and other oil industry acquisitions are reducing the number of companies who rent the offshore rigs that Noble provides. As the industry consolidates, oilfield companies that provide a wider range of rigs and services will get more of the exploration contracts, Day said. ''The more rigs you have, the better able you'll be to respond to their drilling requirements,'' Day said. Day's comments come about two weeks after Global Marine Inc. Chief Executive Robert Rose said oil-drilling companies must consolidate along with their customer base to have muscle in negotiations with fewer, bigger customers. Day declined to name the companies with which Noble has had discussions. He said the company could use a combination of cash and stock to make the purchase. Affordability Oil is fetching its lowest prices since 1986, a level that's likely to remain in the market in the coming year, pushing oil- drilling companies share prices and earnings lower. That will make potential acquisition targets more affordable and give Noble ''a window of opportunity'' to buy a company at a low price, Day said. Crude oil on the New York Mercantile Exchange rose 11 cents to $11.13 a barrel in early afternoon trading. Noble already has expanded its deep-water drilling fleet by making an acquisition. It bought Rotterdam-based Royal Nedlloyd NV's offshore oil- and gas-drilling division in 1996 for about $373 million in cash and stock. To find larger and more profitable reserves, more oil companies are exploring in deep-water areas such as those off West Africa and in the Gulf of Mexico, aided by improving technology. The industry considers deep water to be 350 feet or beyond. ''As an industry we've explored most of the opportunities on land,'' Day said. ''The deep water is the frontier.'' Noble shares fell 1/8 to 12 3/8.