Energy Blast – May 19, 2011

‘Those who prepared the deal should have paid closer attention to the nuances of the shareholder agreement’: President Medvedev gave a verbal knuckle rap to Igor Sechin over the failure of the BP-Rosneft deal at his press conference.  Sechin, who until recently chaired the board of directors of Rosneft, has said he does not consider the collapsed deal a personal failure.  ‘BP was strategically wise but tactically stupid’ says an incisive Moscow Times op-ed from Matthew Hulbert and Christian Brutsch on the event which has tarnished BP’s reputation.  ‘If the loss of the Rosneft deal is part of the election campaign, BP yet again finds itself a pawn in Russian games’, says Foreign Policy.  According to Sechin, Russia will wait one month before embarking upon new plans on how to develop its Arctic oil fields.  Is there still any hope of BP resurrecting the deal?  More on Denmark’s Arctic claims.  Russia’s LUKOIL has bought its first ever Saudi fuel oil cargo, says Reuters.  Gazprom has upped its estimates for European exports this year.