The Weekly Wrap: November 5, 2010
The world versus China on rare earths. An unusually broad and multinational coalition of business associations wants the G-20 nations to help persuade China to reopen its exports of rare-earth elements. Some three dozen associations from the United States, Germany, Japan, South Korea, and elsewhere asked all G-20 members in a letter to "renounce interference ...
The world versus China on rare earths. An unusually broad and multinational coalition of business associations wants the G-20 nations to help persuade China to reopen its exports of rare-earth elements. Some three dozen associations from the United States, Germany, Japan, South Korea, and elsewhere asked all G-20 members in a letter to "renounce interference with commercial sale of rare earth elements, domestically or internationally, to advance industrial policy or political objectives." The appeal follows a Chinese shipping embargo on rare-earth exports to Europe, Japan and the United States that began with a dispute over a fishing trawler in the East China Sea. The G-20 will start meeting next week in Seoul.
The world versus China on rare earths. An unusually broad and multinational coalition of business associations wants the G-20 nations to help persuade China to reopen its exports of rare-earth elements. Some three dozen associations from the United States, Germany, Japan, South Korea, and elsewhere asked all G-20 members in a letter to "renounce interference with commercial sale of rare earth elements, domestically or internationally, to advance industrial policy or political objectives." The appeal follows a Chinese shipping embargo on rare-earth exports to Europe, Japan and the United States that began with a dispute over a fishing trawler in the East China Sea. The G-20 will start meeting next week in Seoul.
A Georgian vote for electric fleets. Shai Agassi got Israel to agree to be a guinea pig for his company Better Place, which aims to provide a network of battery-charging stations for electric cars. But now former Soviet Georgia wants to do him one better: It says it will replace its entire government vehicle fleet with electric and hybrid cars over the next four years. The New York Times‘ Andrew Kramer figures the plan will cost Georgia between $88 million and $166 million, depending on which commercial brands it buys. Georgia largely subsists on foreign aid, but the United States and Japan may welcome such ambition given current pessimism about electric-car sales.
It’s official: Higher oil prices are coming. Over the last two years, petroleum behemoth Saudi Arabia has endorsed oil prices in the $70-per-barrel range, and that is largely where they have stayed. Now the influential kingdom is backing a price boost to $90 a barrel, and prices have recently moved in that direction, closing over $86 a barrel. Saudi oil minister Ali Naimi signaled the shift in a statement in Singapore. Meanwhile JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America Merrill Lynch are both forecasting a jump to over $100 a barrel next year, and the International Energy Agency says prices will be tempered in the coming decades only if governments enact climate-change rules that cause oil demand to drop.
The coming Caspian oil boom. The International Energy Agency is projecting that the Caspian states — Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and Turkmenistan — will produce 5.4 million barrels a day by 2025, double today’s volume, and enough to satisfy 9 percent of total global demand at that time. The IEA also notes, however, that Russia continues to choke off the Caspian natural gas exports.
Shell in trouble for palm-greasing. Royal Dutch/Shell, Switzerland’s Panalpina World Transport and five oil service companies are paying $236 million in penalties to settle a bribery case with the U.S. government. The companies admit that they paid millions of dollars in bribes to officials in seven countries — Angola, Azerbaijan, Brazil, Kazakhstan, Nigeria, Russia, and Turkmenistan — in order to facilitate customs shipments and to circumvent other rules.
Elon Musk’s new friends. Panasonic is investing $30 million for a 2 percent share of Tesla Motors, the Silicon Valley electric-car startup run by Elon Musk. The Japanese electronics-maker joins Daimler and Toyota as big-ticket investors in Musk’s company. Tesla already produces a $109,000 high-end car called the Roadster, and wants to build a mid-range vehicle called the Model S.
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