Traderboersenboard - Einzelnen Beitrag anzeigen - The Gazprom nation

Benjamin · 15-07-2006, 15:51

Fortsetzung des Artikels, Quelle: http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/HE26Ag01.html

Trillion-dollar baby Gazprom

In April, Gazprom knocked back Microsoft as the world's third-largest company by market value. Microsoft was valued at about $246 billion, Gazprom at $270 billion. Already the world's biggest natural-gas company by output and reserves (16% of the total), and with its shares more than tripling in the past 12 months, Gazprom is on the way to displacing Irving, Texas-based ExxonMobil Corp as the world's biggest company, now valued at $381 billion. General Electric is currently the second-biggest at $358 billion.

Gazprom employs 330,000 people and supplies more than 8% of Russia's GDP. It is currently controlled 51% by the Russian state. Since 2001, Gazprom's executive director has been Alexei Miller, who is extremely close to Putin.

Gazprom had a gas output of 547.2 billion cubic meters in 2005. This is equivalent to 9.42 million barrels of oil a day, or the daily extraction output in Saudi Arabia, the world's biggest oil supplier. Gazprom's market value may soon reach as much as $1 trillion, according to its deputy chief executive Dmitri Medvedev, who also happens to be very close to the Kremlin.

Putin's gas chess is always masterful. The president may occasionally threaten the EU that the Russians will go find some other, less demanding customers in case the EU decides to look for less problematic suppliers. But he may also reassure the EU - via German Chancellor Angela Merkel - that a Ukrainian scenario such as January's will never repeat itself (80% of Russia's exports to Europe transit via Ukraine).

Since the 1960s, Russia has been a trusted European supplier - responsible for 50% of the EU's gas imports and 25% of consumption (for oil, Russia supplies 30% and assures 26% of the EU's consumption, as well as more than 30% of the uranium for Europe's nuclear plants).

Gazprom is actively investing in Western distributors and wants to become a global gas giant under vertical integration, selling gas to everyone and his neighbor. What Gazprom wants is to control the whole chain - from production to the final consumer in Europe. What the EU wants is for Gazprom to bring gas to the EU's external borders, where the gas will be bought by EU partners who will then distribute it inside Europe. This would mean the end of long-term Gazprom contracts with European energy giants - a no-no for Putin.

Igor Chubalov, one of Putin's guides ahead of the G8 meeting in St Petersburg in July, is fond of stressing the difference between the strategy of an independent corporation and state policies - even if the Europeans cannot manage to spot the difference. Basically what Chubalov was saying ahead of the recent Putin-Merkel meeting was "We invest in distribution, you invest in production." The word in Brussels is that this was former German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's idea.

Schroeder is the head of the supervisory board of the consortium building the $4.8 billion Northern European Gas Pipeline, the Russian-German gasoduct under the Baltic Sea. He's reportedly being paid hundreds of thousands of dollars a year for the privilege. Other members of the board include Gazprom's big boss Miller (51% of shares) and officials from Germany's energy giants E.ON and BASF (24.5% each).

So Moscow and Berlin have already created a de facto energy alliance between E.ON and BASF and Gazprom. The inevitable result was that eyebrows were raised across the EU - because the 25-member union still does not have a common energy policy. Poland, for instance, has been bypassed by the gasoduct. So for Polish diplomats, the gasoduct is nothing other than "political blackmail".

When Gazprom's boss Miller hints in public, more than once, that trouble with the EU will mean more Russian exports to China, Eastern European diplomats once again cry in unison, "political blackmail" .

In practice, it boils down to Gazprom wanting to buy more gasoducts and distribution companies in Europe, such as British Centrica. And once again the really fascinating question regards the double standards employed by the developed world. Putin, after meeting with Merkel, in essence said that when European companies go to Russia, it's a matter of investment and globalization, but when it happens the other way around, it's a question of Russian companies expanding into Europe.

The new Saudi Arabia
Problems on the European front? No problem. Russia can always go east. And the Europeans know it.

Russia could not be presiding over the G8 at a more delicate moment. The US imperial drive remains defined by the control of sources of energy. To counteract it, Russia wants to invest in a strategic energy partnership with the EU. But the Russians also recognize that the future of global development is in Asia.

Both China and India are employing alternative strategies to the neo-liberal US model. So now Russia is presented with a very auspicious confluence of factors: its own fabulous energy reserves; energy dependence in Europe; and larger-than-life Asian interest in these reserves.

Russia is actually in search of a Euro-Asian equilibrium. As Natalia Narotchnitskaia, vice president of the Russian parliament's Commission of Foreign Affairs, put it, Russia now boasts "energy independence, military power, high level of education, a complete cycle of scientific research, no overpopulation, a huge territory, and a modest level of consumption". She added, "The only country in the world to meet all these criteria is Russia."

On practical terms, for Narotchnitskaia, this should translate into more investment to explore Eastern Siberia and the Russian Far East. And no dreams of integration either with the EU or with NATO. She's in favor of a true "independent historical project".

Energy security, she said, means "a geo-economy which would lift us from demographic decline, reinforce the country and seduce our neighbors, especially those in Central Asia". In other words, a real national project.

For the moment, the facts on the ground tell the story. Gazprom bought Baltic refineries. Gazprom bought majority stakes in distribution companies in Georgia and Belarus. Schroeder presides over the board of the Russian-German gasoduct under the Baltic Sea, controlled 51% by Gazprom. Putin convinces Russians nostalgic for empires past that Putinism is the best nationalism.

Russia fashions a G8 meeting under its terms - exploiting both the US quagmire in Iraq and the EU's dependence on Russian gas. Thus the Gazprom nation is shaping up as the new Saudi Arabia: indispensable to the West, but certainly not integrated with it.

15-07-2006, 15:51	#2
Benjamin TBB Family Registriert seit: Mar 2004 Beiträge: 10.374	Fortsetzung des Artikels, Quelle: http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/HE26Ag01.html Trillion-dollar baby Gazprom In April, Gazprom knocked back Microsoft as the world's third-largest company by market value. Microsoft was valued at about $246 billion, Gazprom at $270 billion. Already the world's biggest natural-gas company by output and reserves (16% of the total), and with its shares more than tripling in the past 12 months, Gazprom is on the way to displacing Irving, Texas-based ExxonMobil Corp as the world's biggest company, now valued at $381 billion. General Electric is currently the second-biggest at $358 billion. Gazprom employs 330,000 people and supplies more than 8% of Russia's GDP. It is currently controlled 51% by the Russian state. Since 2001, Gazprom's executive director has been Alexei Miller, who is extremely close to Putin. Gazprom had a gas output of 547.2 billion cubic meters in 2005. This is equivalent to 9.42 million barrels of oil a day, or the daily extraction output in Saudi Arabia, the world's biggest oil supplier. Gazprom's market value may soon reach as much as $1 trillion, according to its deputy chief executive Dmitri Medvedev, who also happens to be very close to the Kremlin. Putin's gas chess is always masterful. The president may occasionally threaten the EU that the Russians will go find some other, less demanding customers in case the EU decides to look for less problematic suppliers. But he may also reassure the EU - via German Chancellor Angela Merkel - that a Ukrainian scenario such as January's will never repeat itself (80% of Russia's exports to Europe transit via Ukraine). Since the 1960s, Russia has been a trusted European supplier - responsible for 50% of the EU's gas imports and 25% of consumption (for oil, Russia supplies 30% and assures 26% of the EU's consumption, as well as more than 30% of the uranium for Europe's nuclear plants). Gazprom is actively investing in Western distributors and wants to become a global gas giant under vertical integration, selling gas to everyone and his neighbor. What Gazprom wants is to control the whole chain - from production to the final consumer in Europe. What the EU wants is for Gazprom to bring gas to the EU's external borders, where the gas will be bought by EU partners who will then distribute it inside Europe. This would mean the end of long-term Gazprom contracts with European energy giants - a no-no for Putin. Igor Chubalov, one of Putin's guides ahead of the G8 meeting in St Petersburg in July, is fond of stressing the difference between the strategy of an independent corporation and state policies - even if the Europeans cannot manage to spot the difference. Basically what Chubalov was saying ahead of the recent Putin-Merkel meeting was "We invest in distribution, you invest in production." The word in Brussels is that this was former German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's idea. Schroeder is the head of the supervisory board of the consortium building the $4.8 billion Northern European Gas Pipeline, the Russian-German gasoduct under the Baltic Sea. He's reportedly being paid hundreds of thousands of dollars a year for the privilege. Other members of the board include Gazprom's big boss Miller (51% of shares) and officials from Germany's energy giants E.ON and BASF (24.5% each). So Moscow and Berlin have already created a de facto energy alliance between E.ON and BASF and Gazprom. The inevitable result was that eyebrows were raised across the EU - because the 25-member union still does not have a common energy policy. Poland, for instance, has been bypassed by the gasoduct. So for Polish diplomats, the gasoduct is nothing other than "political blackmail". When Gazprom's boss Miller hints in public, more than once, that trouble with the EU will mean more Russian exports to China, Eastern European diplomats once again cry in unison, "political blackmail" . In practice, it boils down to Gazprom wanting to buy more gasoducts and distribution companies in Europe, such as British Centrica. And once again the really fascinating question regards the double standards employed by the developed world. Putin, after meeting with Merkel, in essence said that when European companies go to Russia, it's a matter of investment and globalization, but when it happens the other way around, it's a question of Russian companies expanding into Europe. The new Saudi Arabia Problems on the European front? No problem. Russia can always go east. And the Europeans know it. Russia could not be presiding over the G8 at a more delicate moment. The US imperial drive remains defined by the control of sources of energy. To counteract it, Russia wants to invest in a strategic energy partnership with the EU. But the Russians also recognize that the future of global development is in Asia. Both China and India are employing alternative strategies to the neo-liberal US model. So now Russia is presented with a very auspicious confluence of factors: its own fabulous energy reserves; energy dependence in Europe; and larger-than-life Asian interest in these reserves. Russia is actually in search of a Euro-Asian equilibrium. As Natalia Narotchnitskaia, vice president of the Russian parliament's Commission of Foreign Affairs, put it, Russia now boasts "energy independence, military power, high level of education, a complete cycle of scientific research, no overpopulation, a huge territory, and a modest level of consumption". She added, "The only country in the world to meet all these criteria is Russia." On practical terms, for Narotchnitskaia, this should translate into more investment to explore Eastern Siberia and the Russian Far East. And no dreams of integration either with the EU or with NATO. She's in favor of a true "independent historical project". Energy security, she said, means "a geo-economy which would lift us from demographic decline, reinforce the country and seduce our neighbors, especially those in Central Asia". In other words, a real national project. For the moment, the facts on the ground tell the story. Gazprom bought Baltic refineries. Gazprom bought majority stakes in distribution companies in Georgia and Belarus. Schroeder presides over the board of the Russian-German gasoduct under the Baltic Sea, controlled 51% by Gazprom. Putin convinces Russians nostalgic for empires past that Putinism is the best nationalism. Russia fashions a G8 meeting under its terms - exploiting both the US quagmire in Iraq and the EU's dependence on Russian gas. Thus the Gazprom nation is shaping up as the new Saudi Arabia: indispensable to the West, but certainly not integrated with it.