News

August 09, 2008

That Was The Week That Was… In The UK Oil Markets

By Daniel O’Sullivan

Another week, another US$10 or so off the price of crude oil, and against this background the UK-listed oil and gas companies were never going to prosper. Indeed, the FTSE350 oil and gas sector as a whole was down just over two per cent, with its Aim counterpart also retreating overall.

Even good news wasn’t beating the bearish mentality by Friday. The evidence was clear from the performance of two high-profile Russian oil plays, FTSE250 constituent Imperial Energy and Aim heavyweight Sibir Energy. Both kicked off Monday with vertical share price take-offs, in Imperial’s case on news that a second party was in talks regarding a possible bid proposal - the two unconfirmed contenders are ONGC of India and Sinopec of China - and in Sibir’s case on news that Royal Dutch Shell is...