Welcome to Chariot
Chariot Oil and Gas Limited (AIM: CHAR) is an independent oil and gas exploration company with interests in Namibia. Enigma Oil and Gas Exploration (Pty) Limited is a wholly owned subsidiary of Chariot and is the operator of the licence areas.
Chariot has highly prospective licences in Namibia – strategically positioned within the South Atlantic Margins (counterpart margin to that of Brazil where major discoveries have been announced). All of these blocks are in the exploration phase and Chariot is focused on investigating these using state of the art technologies which have previously led to giant oil finds.
Latest news
14 Oct 2009 Holding in Company
13 Oct 2009 Statement re. Share price movement
09 Oct 2009 Board Change
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Annual Report 2009: Unlocking Namibia’s Oil & Gas Potential
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16:35 27/10/2009
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Shares in issue: 141,173,471
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Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Please God let these deals close!
My Lord God,
I have no idea where I am going
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
Nor do I really know myself,
And the fact that I think I am following
your will does not mean that I am
actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please
you does in fact please you.
And I hope that I have that desire in all
that I am doing.
And I know that if I do this, you
will lead me by the right road
though I may know nothing about it.
Therefore will I trust you always
though I may seem to be lost
and in the shadow of death, I will
not fear, for you are ever with me
and you will never leave me
to face my perils alone.
thomas merton
I have no idea where I am going
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
Nor do I really know myself,
And the fact that I think I am following
your will does not mean that I am
actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please
you does in fact please you.
And I hope that I have that desire in all
that I am doing.
And I know that if I do this, you
will lead me by the right road
though I may know nothing about it.
Therefore will I trust you always
though I may seem to be lost
and in the shadow of death, I will
not fear, for you are ever with me
and you will never leave me
to face my perils alone.
thomas merton
Monday, October 19, 2009
China is buying African oil interests.
China May Stumble in Race With Rivals for African Oil (Update3)
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By Carli Lourens and John Duce
Oct. 19 (Bloomberg) -- China’s plans to buy into oil fields in Africa may suffer a third setback in as many months if Exxon Mobil Corp. succeeds in snapping up drilling rights in Ghana, one of the continent’s newest oil nations.
Closely held Kosmos Energy LLC said last week it agreed to sell its stake in Ghana’s Jubilee oil field to Exxon Mobil, which may thwart ambitions in the same area by Cnooc Ltd., the listed arm of China National Offshore Oil Corp. While Ghanaian government officials say the Exxon deal, worth about $4 billion according to a person familiar with the transaction, has not been officially approved, Chinese explorers have hit hurdles since July on other oil deals in Angola and Libya.
At stake is China’s ability to secure fuel for its economy, which expanded 7.9 percent in the second quarter from a year earlier. China’s oil companies in Africa are diversifying from construction projects as a means to gain access to mineral resources, and turning to strategies that include Western deal structures and local banks. In the process, they are competing with some of the world’s biggest oil companies in the U.S. and Europe also seeking resources in the region.
“The Chinese are frustrated that they’re not doing more deals,” said Kobus van der Wath, group managing director of The Beijing Axis, which advises Chinese companies expanding overseas. “The interest, intent and general capacity to do deals is far greater.” He estimates non-financial investments in Africa may climb as high as $3 billion this year, double the 2008 level.
Secure Supplies
Since Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao visited seven African nations in 2006 and promised to double aid, establish a $5 billion investment fund and provide $3 billion in loans, China’s energy companies have announced plans to spend at least $16 billion on oil and gas fields on the continent.
“Chinese oil companies are very keen to gain stakes in large oilfields that are nearing production or are in the development stages,” said Thomas Grieder, a London-based analyst at market intelligence firm IHS Global Insight. “The government is keen to secure long-term supplies.”
China’s economy will need more than 11 million barrels of oil a day in five years, 38 percent more than last year, according to Paul Ting, president of New Jersey-based Paul Ting Energy Vision LLC, a Chinese oil and gas consultant.
On Aug. 27, Cnooc said it will step up exploration and acquisitions to meet fuel demand in China. Chairman Fu Chengyu said the company changed its overseas strategy to focus on taking stakes in ventures rather than buying out companies after failing to acquire Unocal Corp. of the U.S. in 2005.
Cnooc shares in Hong Kong more than doubled over the past year and closed at HK$12.42 today.
Cnooc-Ghana Talks
On Oct. 14, Ghana’s Energy Ministry spokesman Michael Sarpong said Cnooc was in talks with Ghanaian officials, without giving details.
His comment followed a Wall Street Journal report on Oct. 12 that said Cnooc was negotiating with Ghana National Petroleum Corp. to bid for Kosmos’s stake in Jubilee. Xiao Zongwei, a spokesman for Cnooc, declined to comment on the article, which cited unidentified people.
Ghana National Petroleum, known as GNPC, is “still in discussions” with Kosmos to acquire the stake, Thomas Manu, its director of exploration and production, said Oct. 13. “GNPC will acquire the stake and then consider proposals from other companies” to take on as partners, he said.
Further south off Angola, Cnooc’s $1.3 billion bid to buy 20 percent of an oil block from Marathon Oil Corp. may be held up after Marathon said the Angolan government and other partners have rights of first refusal. That bid was announced in July with China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., known as Sinopec.
Sinopec in Hong Kong rose 23 percent in the past year and closed at HK$7.06 today.
‘Intense’ Competition
The competition for overseas energy assets is “intense,” Su Shulin, President of Sinopec Group, said in an interview in Beijing Oct. 15. “There are opportunities in overseas acquisitions, but there are also many people looking at them.”
Cnooc’s Xiao declined to comment on reports the deal to sell Marathon Oil’s stake to Cnooc and Sinopec has been delayed by Angola’s government. Huang Wensheng, spokesman for Sinopec, said the company has no information on whether Angola has blocked the deal and declined to comment further.
Separately, Libya vetoed a C$499 million ($482 million) bid last month by China National Petroleum Corp., the Asian nation’s biggest oil and gas company, for Calgary-based Verenex Energy Inc., which has stakes in the North African country.
China National Offshore Oil expressed interest in Tullow Oil Plc’s oil finds in Uganda as the U.K. explorer with the most licenses in Africa started compiling a short list of potential bidders for a stake in a project in the country.
Lake Albert
Tullow said Sept. 17 the Ngassa oil field in Uganda may be the largest discovery in the Lake Albert Rift Basin. The Chinese explorer is interested in investing in the project, according to Brian Glover, Tullow Uganda’s country manager.
Tullow said about 10 companies had pre-qualified to work on the field. He was commenting after Dow Jones on Oct. 2 cited an unnamed official at Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni’s office saying Cnooc had held talks with Uganda on joining a project. Tamale Mirundi, a spokesman for Museveni, would neither confirm nor deny talks, while Cnooc’s Xiao declined to comment.
In West Africa, China Petrochemical Corp., or Sinopec Group, the nation’s second-largest oil company, acquired Swiss- based Addax Petroleum Corp. this year for C$8.3 billion ($8 billion), adding oil reserves in Nigeria, Cameroon and Gabon.
China National Offshore Oil is also among companies in talks to buy 16 production licenses in the West African nation, Olusegun Adeniyi, a spokesman for Nigeria’s President Umaru Yar’Adua, said in an e-mail on Sept. 29.
Surging Investment
Chinese direct investment in Africa surged 81 percent in the first half to $552 million from a year earlier, according to an Aug. 18 report by China’s Ministry of Commerce.
In Nigeria, Africa’s biggest oil producer, China’s strategy has evolved and oil-for-infrastructure deals are “dead,” Gregory Mthembu-Salter wrote in a September research paper for the South African Institute of International Affairs.
“The model has been replaced by one in which Chinese energy companies gain access to the country’s oil resources by buying stakes in established companies.”
To contact the reporters on this story: Carli Lourens in Johannesburg at clourens@bloomberg.net; John Duce in Hong Kong at Jduce1@bloomberg.net
Last Updated: October 19, 2009 08:51 EDT
Share | Email | Print | A A A
By Carli Lourens and John Duce
Oct. 19 (Bloomberg) -- China’s plans to buy into oil fields in Africa may suffer a third setback in as many months if Exxon Mobil Corp. succeeds in snapping up drilling rights in Ghana, one of the continent’s newest oil nations.
Closely held Kosmos Energy LLC said last week it agreed to sell its stake in Ghana’s Jubilee oil field to Exxon Mobil, which may thwart ambitions in the same area by Cnooc Ltd., the listed arm of China National Offshore Oil Corp. While Ghanaian government officials say the Exxon deal, worth about $4 billion according to a person familiar with the transaction, has not been officially approved, Chinese explorers have hit hurdles since July on other oil deals in Angola and Libya.
At stake is China’s ability to secure fuel for its economy, which expanded 7.9 percent in the second quarter from a year earlier. China’s oil companies in Africa are diversifying from construction projects as a means to gain access to mineral resources, and turning to strategies that include Western deal structures and local banks. In the process, they are competing with some of the world’s biggest oil companies in the U.S. and Europe also seeking resources in the region.
“The Chinese are frustrated that they’re not doing more deals,” said Kobus van der Wath, group managing director of The Beijing Axis, which advises Chinese companies expanding overseas. “The interest, intent and general capacity to do deals is far greater.” He estimates non-financial investments in Africa may climb as high as $3 billion this year, double the 2008 level.
Secure Supplies
Since Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao visited seven African nations in 2006 and promised to double aid, establish a $5 billion investment fund and provide $3 billion in loans, China’s energy companies have announced plans to spend at least $16 billion on oil and gas fields on the continent.
“Chinese oil companies are very keen to gain stakes in large oilfields that are nearing production or are in the development stages,” said Thomas Grieder, a London-based analyst at market intelligence firm IHS Global Insight. “The government is keen to secure long-term supplies.”
China’s economy will need more than 11 million barrels of oil a day in five years, 38 percent more than last year, according to Paul Ting, president of New Jersey-based Paul Ting Energy Vision LLC, a Chinese oil and gas consultant.
On Aug. 27, Cnooc said it will step up exploration and acquisitions to meet fuel demand in China. Chairman Fu Chengyu said the company changed its overseas strategy to focus on taking stakes in ventures rather than buying out companies after failing to acquire Unocal Corp. of the U.S. in 2005.
Cnooc shares in Hong Kong more than doubled over the past year and closed at HK$12.42 today.
Cnooc-Ghana Talks
On Oct. 14, Ghana’s Energy Ministry spokesman Michael Sarpong said Cnooc was in talks with Ghanaian officials, without giving details.
His comment followed a Wall Street Journal report on Oct. 12 that said Cnooc was negotiating with Ghana National Petroleum Corp. to bid for Kosmos’s stake in Jubilee. Xiao Zongwei, a spokesman for Cnooc, declined to comment on the article, which cited unidentified people.
Ghana National Petroleum, known as GNPC, is “still in discussions” with Kosmos to acquire the stake, Thomas Manu, its director of exploration and production, said Oct. 13. “GNPC will acquire the stake and then consider proposals from other companies” to take on as partners, he said.
Further south off Angola, Cnooc’s $1.3 billion bid to buy 20 percent of an oil block from Marathon Oil Corp. may be held up after Marathon said the Angolan government and other partners have rights of first refusal. That bid was announced in July with China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., known as Sinopec.
Sinopec in Hong Kong rose 23 percent in the past year and closed at HK$7.06 today.
‘Intense’ Competition
The competition for overseas energy assets is “intense,” Su Shulin, President of Sinopec Group, said in an interview in Beijing Oct. 15. “There are opportunities in overseas acquisitions, but there are also many people looking at them.”
Cnooc’s Xiao declined to comment on reports the deal to sell Marathon Oil’s stake to Cnooc and Sinopec has been delayed by Angola’s government. Huang Wensheng, spokesman for Sinopec, said the company has no information on whether Angola has blocked the deal and declined to comment further.
Separately, Libya vetoed a C$499 million ($482 million) bid last month by China National Petroleum Corp., the Asian nation’s biggest oil and gas company, for Calgary-based Verenex Energy Inc., which has stakes in the North African country.
China National Offshore Oil expressed interest in Tullow Oil Plc’s oil finds in Uganda as the U.K. explorer with the most licenses in Africa started compiling a short list of potential bidders for a stake in a project in the country.
Lake Albert
Tullow said Sept. 17 the Ngassa oil field in Uganda may be the largest discovery in the Lake Albert Rift Basin. The Chinese explorer is interested in investing in the project, according to Brian Glover, Tullow Uganda’s country manager.
Tullow said about 10 companies had pre-qualified to work on the field. He was commenting after Dow Jones on Oct. 2 cited an unnamed official at Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni’s office saying Cnooc had held talks with Uganda on joining a project. Tamale Mirundi, a spokesman for Museveni, would neither confirm nor deny talks, while Cnooc’s Xiao declined to comment.
In West Africa, China Petrochemical Corp., or Sinopec Group, the nation’s second-largest oil company, acquired Swiss- based Addax Petroleum Corp. this year for C$8.3 billion ($8 billion), adding oil reserves in Nigeria, Cameroon and Gabon.
China National Offshore Oil is also among companies in talks to buy 16 production licenses in the West African nation, Olusegun Adeniyi, a spokesman for Nigeria’s President Umaru Yar’Adua, said in an e-mail on Sept. 29.
Surging Investment
Chinese direct investment in Africa surged 81 percent in the first half to $552 million from a year earlier, according to an Aug. 18 report by China’s Ministry of Commerce.
In Nigeria, Africa’s biggest oil producer, China’s strategy has evolved and oil-for-infrastructure deals are “dead,” Gregory Mthembu-Salter wrote in a September research paper for the South African Institute of International Affairs.
“The model has been replaced by one in which Chinese energy companies gain access to the country’s oil resources by buying stakes in established companies.”
To contact the reporters on this story: Carli Lourens in Johannesburg at clourens@bloomberg.net; John Duce in Hong Kong at Jduce1@bloomberg.net
Last Updated: October 19, 2009 08:51 EDT
Friday, October 16, 2009
B of A is the worst!
Bank of America Posts Third-Quarter Loss on Defaults (Update4)
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By David Mildenberg
Oct. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Bank of America Corp., the biggest U.S. lender, posted its second quarterly loss in less than a year, unable to shake off effects of the economic contraction that drove the company to take two taxpayer bailouts.
The $1 billion third-quarter loss, or 26 cents per diluted share, compared with a profit of $1.18 billion, or 15 cents, a year earlier, the Charlotte, North Carolina-based bank said today in a statement. The loss was more than analysts estimated and the only one posted by the nation’s three biggest lenders. Bank of America dropped 4.1 percent in New York trading.
The quarterly report will be the last supervised by Chief Executive Officer Kenneth Lewis, 62, who retires Dec. 31 after regulators and shareholders criticized his pursuit of Merrill Lynch & Co. The bank reported a fourth-quarter loss in 2008, its first in 17 years, and Lewis is trying to lead a rebound while fending off state and federal probes of the Merrill deal. He agreed yesterday to give up his 2009 salary and bonus.
“The idea that the financial crisis is over is a fantasy and it looks like the numbers bear that out,” said Harvard University professor Niall Ferguson on Bloomberg Television. “It’s clearly not over for Bank of America.”
Bank of America shares have rebounded fivefold since February when they traded at less than $3, their lowest in more than 20 years, on concern that the U.S. would seize a stake in the company. The stock declined 75 cents to $17.35 at 12:59 p.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading.
Succession Plans
Lewis declined to reveal who he’d recommend as a successor or give a timetable during a conference call today with analysts, saying only that the bank has an “appropriate sense of urgency.” He praised wealth management head Sallie Krawcheck and Tom Montag, who runs investment and corporate banking and markets.
“I’ve been very impressed with Tom Montag’s ability to attract really outstanding people when we have lost or needed to fill a position,” Lewis said. “I’m very pleased with the things Sallie Krawcheck is doing.”
Lewis has been under fire for not disclosing losses at Merrill Lynch and plans to pay $3.6 billion in bonuses at the firm before shareholders voted to approve the takeover in December. That sparked investigations by the Securities and Exchange Commission, Congress and attorneys general in New York, North Carolina and Ohio. Shareholders stripped Lewis of his chairman’s title in April.
The bank has agreed to turn over more documents tied to the CEO’s deliberations, and New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has said he might pursue individual bank executives.
Lewis Says ‘Enough’
The decision by Lewis to step down was made when he took some time off, Lewis told analysts today. He reflected on “two- thirds of my life being at the company, and felt like it was the appropriate time,” Lewis said. “I always thought I would intuitively know that, and I did. Forty years with the same company and eight years as CEO was enough.”
The quarter’s results were aided by profit from Merrill Lynch, with gains from trading bonds, stocks and currencies. Losses on home lending and insurance widened to $1.6 billion from $724 million, and the loss on credit cards expanded to $1.04 billion from $167 million.
The bank said the provision for credit losses was $11.7 billion, with $9.6 billion of loans considered uncollectible. Reserves for future losses increased by $2.1 billion, compared with a $4.7 billion addition in the previous quarter, the statement said. The bank’s reserve is now 4 percent of total loans, compared with 4.7 percent at JPMorgan Chase & Co. and 5.9 percent at Citigroup Inc., analyst John McDonald of Bernstein Research said in a report today.
Revenue, Write-Offs
“Credit costs remain high, and that is our major financial challenge going forward,” Lewis said in the statement. “However, we are heartened by early positive signs, such as the leveling of delinquencies among our credit-card customers.”
Bank of America reported total revenue increased 32 percent to $26.4 billion. The total was 13 percent lower than forecast by Chris Mutascio of Stifel Nicolaus & Co.
Revenue from credit cards, brokerage services, investment banking and mortgage banking slid from the previous quarter, and Bank of America’s noninterest income dropped by 31 percent to $14.6 billion. Those declines offset a 57 percent gain in trading account profits.
Bank of America said net write-offs of uncollectible loans rose 11 percent from the second quarter to $9.62 billion. The bank wrote off $3.2 billion of home loans, including home equity loans, during the quarter, up 10 percent from the second quarter. Charge-offs on credit cards increased 5 percent to $2.17 billion.
Industry Profits
JPMorgan Chase & Co., the second-biggest U.S. bank by assets, said this week that third-quarter profit climbed almost sevenfold to $3.59 billion. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. said its income more than doubled to $3.19 billion. Both New York banks repaid their U.S. bailout funds.
Citigroup, the third-biggest U.S. bank, posted a $101 million profit yesterday as CEO Vikram Pandit said he wants to repay $45 billion in U.S. bailout funds as soon as possible. Bank of America also owes $45 billion.
Bank of America, largest in the U.S. by deposits and assets, was hampered during the quarter by accounting rules that require the lender to assess the value of some outstanding debt. Falling prices entitle the bank to take gains, on the theory that the debt could be bought back and retired for less money, while rallies that boost the price lead to charges that reduce reported earnings.
Acquisitions
Bank of America also earmarked $402 million to settle a dispute over a plan to share losses with the Treasury Department on $118 billion of loans and mortgage-backed securities, mostly acquired in the Merrill transaction.
Lewis has said the purchases of Merrill on Jan. 1 and home lender Countrywide Financial Corp. in July 2008 during the worst of the credit crunch bore fruit during the first part of this year, providing most of the company’s earnings growth.
Bank of America expects to add to its 20.5 percent share of U.S. home lending over the next five years, Barbara Desoer, president of home loans and insurance, said in an Oct. 14 interview. Home loans not accruing interest increased by 14 percent to $16.5 billion, or 6.9 percent of the bank’s loans and foreclosed properties, the bank said.
To contact the reporter on this story: David Mildenberg in Charlotte at dmildenberg@bloomberg.net
Last Updated: October 16, 2009 13:11 EDT
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By David Mildenberg
Oct. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Bank of America Corp., the biggest U.S. lender, posted its second quarterly loss in less than a year, unable to shake off effects of the economic contraction that drove the company to take two taxpayer bailouts.
The $1 billion third-quarter loss, or 26 cents per diluted share, compared with a profit of $1.18 billion, or 15 cents, a year earlier, the Charlotte, North Carolina-based bank said today in a statement. The loss was more than analysts estimated and the only one posted by the nation’s three biggest lenders. Bank of America dropped 4.1 percent in New York trading.
The quarterly report will be the last supervised by Chief Executive Officer Kenneth Lewis, 62, who retires Dec. 31 after regulators and shareholders criticized his pursuit of Merrill Lynch & Co. The bank reported a fourth-quarter loss in 2008, its first in 17 years, and Lewis is trying to lead a rebound while fending off state and federal probes of the Merrill deal. He agreed yesterday to give up his 2009 salary and bonus.
“The idea that the financial crisis is over is a fantasy and it looks like the numbers bear that out,” said Harvard University professor Niall Ferguson on Bloomberg Television. “It’s clearly not over for Bank of America.”
Bank of America shares have rebounded fivefold since February when they traded at less than $3, their lowest in more than 20 years, on concern that the U.S. would seize a stake in the company. The stock declined 75 cents to $17.35 at 12:59 p.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading.
Succession Plans
Lewis declined to reveal who he’d recommend as a successor or give a timetable during a conference call today with analysts, saying only that the bank has an “appropriate sense of urgency.” He praised wealth management head Sallie Krawcheck and Tom Montag, who runs investment and corporate banking and markets.
“I’ve been very impressed with Tom Montag’s ability to attract really outstanding people when we have lost or needed to fill a position,” Lewis said. “I’m very pleased with the things Sallie Krawcheck is doing.”
Lewis has been under fire for not disclosing losses at Merrill Lynch and plans to pay $3.6 billion in bonuses at the firm before shareholders voted to approve the takeover in December. That sparked investigations by the Securities and Exchange Commission, Congress and attorneys general in New York, North Carolina and Ohio. Shareholders stripped Lewis of his chairman’s title in April.
The bank has agreed to turn over more documents tied to the CEO’s deliberations, and New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has said he might pursue individual bank executives.
Lewis Says ‘Enough’
The decision by Lewis to step down was made when he took some time off, Lewis told analysts today. He reflected on “two- thirds of my life being at the company, and felt like it was the appropriate time,” Lewis said. “I always thought I would intuitively know that, and I did. Forty years with the same company and eight years as CEO was enough.”
The quarter’s results were aided by profit from Merrill Lynch, with gains from trading bonds, stocks and currencies. Losses on home lending and insurance widened to $1.6 billion from $724 million, and the loss on credit cards expanded to $1.04 billion from $167 million.
The bank said the provision for credit losses was $11.7 billion, with $9.6 billion of loans considered uncollectible. Reserves for future losses increased by $2.1 billion, compared with a $4.7 billion addition in the previous quarter, the statement said. The bank’s reserve is now 4 percent of total loans, compared with 4.7 percent at JPMorgan Chase & Co. and 5.9 percent at Citigroup Inc., analyst John McDonald of Bernstein Research said in a report today.
Revenue, Write-Offs
“Credit costs remain high, and that is our major financial challenge going forward,” Lewis said in the statement. “However, we are heartened by early positive signs, such as the leveling of delinquencies among our credit-card customers.”
Bank of America reported total revenue increased 32 percent to $26.4 billion. The total was 13 percent lower than forecast by Chris Mutascio of Stifel Nicolaus & Co.
Revenue from credit cards, brokerage services, investment banking and mortgage banking slid from the previous quarter, and Bank of America’s noninterest income dropped by 31 percent to $14.6 billion. Those declines offset a 57 percent gain in trading account profits.
Bank of America said net write-offs of uncollectible loans rose 11 percent from the second quarter to $9.62 billion. The bank wrote off $3.2 billion of home loans, including home equity loans, during the quarter, up 10 percent from the second quarter. Charge-offs on credit cards increased 5 percent to $2.17 billion.
Industry Profits
JPMorgan Chase & Co., the second-biggest U.S. bank by assets, said this week that third-quarter profit climbed almost sevenfold to $3.59 billion. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. said its income more than doubled to $3.19 billion. Both New York banks repaid their U.S. bailout funds.
Citigroup, the third-biggest U.S. bank, posted a $101 million profit yesterday as CEO Vikram Pandit said he wants to repay $45 billion in U.S. bailout funds as soon as possible. Bank of America also owes $45 billion.
Bank of America, largest in the U.S. by deposits and assets, was hampered during the quarter by accounting rules that require the lender to assess the value of some outstanding debt. Falling prices entitle the bank to take gains, on the theory that the debt could be bought back and retired for less money, while rallies that boost the price lead to charges that reduce reported earnings.
Acquisitions
Bank of America also earmarked $402 million to settle a dispute over a plan to share losses with the Treasury Department on $118 billion of loans and mortgage-backed securities, mostly acquired in the Merrill transaction.
Lewis has said the purchases of Merrill on Jan. 1 and home lender Countrywide Financial Corp. in July 2008 during the worst of the credit crunch bore fruit during the first part of this year, providing most of the company’s earnings growth.
Bank of America expects to add to its 20.5 percent share of U.S. home lending over the next five years, Barbara Desoer, president of home loans and insurance, said in an Oct. 14 interview. Home loans not accruing interest increased by 14 percent to $16.5 billion, or 6.9 percent of the bank’s loans and foreclosed properties, the bank said.
To contact the reporter on this story: David Mildenberg in Charlotte at dmildenberg@bloomberg.net
Last Updated: October 16, 2009 13:11 EDT
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Where is the ice?
Arctic ice cap 'to disappear in future summers'
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Delicious Digg Facebook Fark Newsvine Reddit StumbleUpon Technorati Twitter Yahoo! Bookmarks Print AFP/HO/File – In this undated image obatined from www.catlinarcticsurvey.com, British explorers Pen Hadow (R) and Ann … by Elodie Mazein Elodie Mazein – Thu Oct 15, 4:35 am ET
LONDON (AFP) – The Arctic ice cap will disappear completely in summer months within 20 to 30 years, a polar research team said as they presented findings from an expedition led by adventurer Pen Hadow.
It is likely to be largely ice-free during the warmer months within a decade, the experts added.
Veteran polar explorer Hadow and two other Britons went out on the Arctic ice cap for 73 days during the northern spring, taking more than 6,000 measurements and observations of the sea ice.
The raw data they collected from March to May has been analysed, producing some stark predictions about the state of the ice cap.
"The summer ice cover will completely vanish in 20 to 30 years but in less than that it will have considerably retreated," said Professor Peter Wadhams, head of the polar ocean physics group at Britain's prestigious Cambridge University.
"In about 10 years, the Arctic ice will be considered as open sea."
Starting off from northern Canada, Hadow, Martin Hartley and Ann Daniels skied over the ice cap to measure the thickness of the remaining ice, assessing its density and the depth of overlying snow, as well as taking weather and sea temperature readings.
Across their 450-kilometre (290 mile) route, the average thickness of the ice floes was 1.8 metres (six feet), while it was 4.8 metres when incorporating the compressed ridges of ice.
"An average thickness of 1.8 metres is typical of first year ice, which is more vulnerable in the summer. And the multi-year ice is shrinking back more rapidly," said Wadhams.
"It's a concrete example of global change in action.
"With a larger part of the region now in first year ice, it is clearly more vulnerable. The area is now more likely to become open water each summer, bringing forward the potential date when the summer sea ice will be completely gone."
Doctor Martin Sommerkorn, senior climate change adviser for the World Wide Fund for Nature's international Arctic programme, said the survey painted a sombre picture of the ice meltdown, which was happening "faster than we thought".
"Remove the Arctic ice cap and we are left with a very different and much warmer world," he said.
Loss of sea ice cover will "set in motion powerful climate feedbacks which will have an impact far beyond the Arctic itself," he added.
"This could lead to flooding affecting one quarter of the world's population, substantial increases in greenhouse gas emission from massive carbon pools and extreme global weather changes."
"Today's findings provide yet another urgent call for action to world leaders ahead of the United Nations climate summit in Copenhagen in December to rapidly and effectively curb global greenhouse gas emissions."
Buzz up! Send
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Delicious Digg Facebook Fark Newsvine Reddit StumbleUpon Technorati Twitter Yahoo! Bookmarks Print AFP/HO/File – In this undated image obatined from www.catlinarcticsurvey.com, British explorers Pen Hadow (R) and Ann … by Elodie Mazein Elodie Mazein – Thu Oct 15, 4:35 am ET
LONDON (AFP) – The Arctic ice cap will disappear completely in summer months within 20 to 30 years, a polar research team said as they presented findings from an expedition led by adventurer Pen Hadow.
It is likely to be largely ice-free during the warmer months within a decade, the experts added.
Veteran polar explorer Hadow and two other Britons went out on the Arctic ice cap for 73 days during the northern spring, taking more than 6,000 measurements and observations of the sea ice.
The raw data they collected from March to May has been analysed, producing some stark predictions about the state of the ice cap.
"The summer ice cover will completely vanish in 20 to 30 years but in less than that it will have considerably retreated," said Professor Peter Wadhams, head of the polar ocean physics group at Britain's prestigious Cambridge University.
"In about 10 years, the Arctic ice will be considered as open sea."
Starting off from northern Canada, Hadow, Martin Hartley and Ann Daniels skied over the ice cap to measure the thickness of the remaining ice, assessing its density and the depth of overlying snow, as well as taking weather and sea temperature readings.
Across their 450-kilometre (290 mile) route, the average thickness of the ice floes was 1.8 metres (six feet), while it was 4.8 metres when incorporating the compressed ridges of ice.
"An average thickness of 1.8 metres is typical of first year ice, which is more vulnerable in the summer. And the multi-year ice is shrinking back more rapidly," said Wadhams.
"It's a concrete example of global change in action.
"With a larger part of the region now in first year ice, it is clearly more vulnerable. The area is now more likely to become open water each summer, bringing forward the potential date when the summer sea ice will be completely gone."
Doctor Martin Sommerkorn, senior climate change adviser for the World Wide Fund for Nature's international Arctic programme, said the survey painted a sombre picture of the ice meltdown, which was happening "faster than we thought".
"Remove the Arctic ice cap and we are left with a very different and much warmer world," he said.
Loss of sea ice cover will "set in motion powerful climate feedbacks which will have an impact far beyond the Arctic itself," he added.
"This could lead to flooding affecting one quarter of the world's population, substantial increases in greenhouse gas emission from massive carbon pools and extreme global weather changes."
"Today's findings provide yet another urgent call for action to world leaders ahead of the United Nations climate summit in Copenhagen in December to rapidly and effectively curb global greenhouse gas emissions."
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