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Brent crude futures were down $2.6, or 3.5%, at $82.50 a barrel by 12:50 p.m. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) U.S. crude futures fell $2.67, or 3.4% to $76.20. U.S. crude oil and fuel inventories rose last week to their highest levels since June 2021, the Energy Information Administration said, as demand remained weak. "The market is reacting to the report that indicates there isn't demand for crude oil or fuels," said John Kilduff, partner at Again Capital LLC in New York. Elsewhere, Russia's Deputy Prime Minister said he expected oil demand to rise on the back of Chinese economic activity.

LONDON, Feb 1 (Reuters) - Oil prices ticked up as the market is looking towards a meeting of OPEC and its allies as well as a Federal Reserve rate decision and U.S. government data on crude and fuel stockpiles on Wednesday. Brent crude futures rose 45 cents, or 0.5%, to $85.91 a barrel at 1215 GMT. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) U.S. crude futures rose 62 cents, or 0.8%, to $79.49 a barrel. Tamer U.S. rate hike expectations helped lower the dollar index , which supported oil prices as a weaker greenback makes the commodity cheaper for buyers holding other currencies, according to Stephen Brennock, analyst at PVM. OPEC's oil output fell in January, as Iraqi exports dropped and Nigeria's output did not recover, with the 10 OPEC members pumping 920,000 barrels per day (bpd) below their targeted volumes under the OPEC+ agreement, a Reuters survey found.

LONDON, Feb 1 (Reuters) - Oil prices were broadly stable as the market is looking towards a meeting of OPEC and its allies as well as a Federal Reserve rate decision and U.S. government data on crude and fuel stockpiles on Wednesday. Brent crude futures dipped 11 cents, or 0.1%, to $85.35 a barrel at 0949 GMT. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) U.S. crude futures rose 8 cents, or 0.1%, to $78.95 a barrel. Tamer U.S. rate hike expectations helped lower the dollar index , which supported oil prices as a weaker greenback makes the commodity cheaper for buyers holding other currencies, according to Stephen Brennock, analyst at PVM. OPEC's oil output fell in January, as Iraqi exports dropped and Nigeria's output did not recover, with the 10 OPEC members pumping 920,000 barrels per day (bpd) below their targeted volumes under the OPEC+ agreement, a Reuters survey found.

LONDON, Jan 27 (Reuters) - Oil prices rose for a second session on Friday, buoyed by stronger than expected U.S. economic growth, strong middle distillate refining margins and hopes of a rapid recovery in Chinese demand. OPEC+ delegates meet next week to review crude production levels, with sources from the oil producer group expecting no change to current output policy. "The positive batch of data gave oil prices a lift," said PVM analyst Stephen Brennock. Gains on U.S. crude were capped by a 4.2 million barrel build in stocks at Cushing, the pricing hub for NYMEX oil futures, this week. Reporting by Shadia Nasralla Additional reporting by Sudarshan Varadhan in Singapore Editing by David GoodmanOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Palliser and some of Capricorn's biggest shareholders had also publicly opposed a planned merger with Israeli gas producer NewMed (NWMDp.TA), with major proxy advisers recommending votes against the merger plan and Capricorn's board. Chairperson Nicoletta Giadrossi, CEO Simon Thomson and three other directors stepped down from the board with immediate effect, Capricorn said on Tuesday. NewMed said in a statement following Capricorn's board shake-up that it saw a significantly smaller chance of finalising the merger. Capricorn postponed the NewMed vote to Feb. 22, while the meeting called by Palliser regarding the directors will go ahead as planned. The NewMed merger plan, announced in September, aims to create an Israel-Egypt focused gas producer, but several shareholders have said the deal undervalues Capricorn.

Power giant Orsted aims to build a huge offshore windfarm to help the country meet renewable goals. Last year the North Sea Transition Authority (NSTA), which regulates offshore energy activity, concluded that large crossovers between such ventures were unfeasible with current technology. This largely unreported clash risks undermining Britain's drive to meet its climate goals, according to the companies involved and a North Sea green transition expert. The BP-Orsted showdown could also presage similar disputes elsewhere in an increasingly crowded North Sea, the experts told Reuters. There is hope on the horizon for wind and CCS projects that share ground, say regulators and industry experts.

☆ Exclusive: Harbour Energy to cut jobs due to UK windfall tax
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-18 | by ( Ron Bousso | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

The jobs would be cut in Harbour Energy's headquarters in the North Sea hub of Aberdeen, Scotland, but the extent of the cuts is yet to be determined and will be subject to consultations. Harbour Energy Plc has 1,700 employees worldwide, according to its website. Executives in North Sea companies have urged the British government to introduce a price floor to mitigate the impact of the windfall tax as firms struggle to access new funding. Industry group OEUK said in response to Harbour's announcement that the windfall tax will further undercut spending. Companies including Shell Plc (SHEL.L) and Equinor ASA (EQNR.OL) have already said they will review their North Sea investments.

"We are ready to add a number of your nominees to the board promptly and well before the general meetings," Capricorn said in a letter to Palliser posted on its website. Capricorn declined to clarify how exactly the board might change. Madison Avenue Partners, Capricorn's biggest shareholder at around 8%, on Monday separately reiterated its opposition to the board. The shareholder meeting to vote on the board changes is planned for Feb. 1, with a shareholder vote on the NewMed deal "on or around the same date", Capricorn said. "Holding the general meetings so close together deprives any reconstituted Capricorn board of the opportunity to re-assess the merits and terms of the NewMed transaction in parallel with a consideration of a range of other options," the statement said.

☆ Oil prices rise over $2 on drawdown in U.S. crude stocks
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-21 | by ( Arathy Somasekhar | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

Brent crude futures for February delivery were up by $2.23, or 2.8%, at $82.22 a barrel by 12:20 p.m. U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures gained $2.03, or 2.7%, to $78.26. U.S. crude inventories fell by 5.89 million barrels, according to data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), compared with estimates for a drop of 1.66 million barrels. Distillate inventories fell by 242,000 barrels, according to EIA data, compared with analyst estimates for a build of 336,000 barrels. Overall, Russian oil exports fell by 11% month on month for Dec. 1-20 after the European Union's embargo on Russian oil came into force, the Kommersant daily reported.

Brent crude futures were up 93 cents, or 1.15%, at $80.92 a barrel by 1040 GMT. U.S. crude inventories fell by about 3.1 million barrels in the week to Dec. 16, said market sources, citing data from the American Petroleum Institute. Worries about surging COVID-19 cases in China as the country begins dismantling its zero-COVID policy kept oil prices from moving higher. Overall, Russian oil exports fell by 11% month on month for Dec. 1-20 after the European Union's embargo on Russian oil came into force, the Kommersant daily reported. Reporting by Shadia Nasralla and Dmitry Zhdannikov; Additional reporting by Isabel Kua in Singapore Editing by David GoodmanOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

LONDON, Dec 19 (Reuters) - Capricorn Energy's (CNE.L) third-biggest shareholder, Palliser Capital, has called for a general meeting to set a vote on removing seven Capricorn directors from supervisory roles including the CEO, according to documents seen by Reuters. "We have requisitioned the board of Capricorn Energy ... to convene a general meeting (the "EGM") of the Company," Palliser Chief Investment Officer James Smith said in a Dec. 19 letter to Capricorn shareholders. "The EGM will enable shareholders to vote on resolutions to effect the removal of seven current Capricorn directors and the appointment of six independent, highly-qualified replacement candidates." The directors that Palliser wants to remove include Capricorn Chief Executive Officer Simon Thomson and its chief financial officer, also named James Smith, who both hold executive and supervisory roles. The shareholder meeting to vote on Palliser's resolutions has to take place by Jan. 30, Palliser said.

Brent crude futures settled up $2.02, or 2.4%, to $82.70 per barrel, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures settled up $1.94 to $77.28. Both contracts rose on a surge in diesel futures ahead of cold weather expected towards the end of the year. Sending bearish signals, U.S. crude oil stockpiles rose by more than 10 million barrels last week, the most since March 2021, buoyed by releases from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and as refiners reduced activity. Looking into 2023, OPEC said it expects oil demand to grow by 2.25 million barrels per day (bpd) over next year to 101.8 million bpd, with potential upside from China, the world's top importer. The IEA, seeing Chinese oil demand recovering next year after a 400,000-bpd contraction in 2022, raised its 2023 oil demand growth estimate to 1.7 million bpd for a total of 101.6 million bpd.

LONDON, Dec 9 (Reuters) - The British government stood firm on its windfall tax on the oil and gas sector in a meeting with industry executives on Friday, two sources with knowledge of what was discussed said. Finance Minister Jeremy Hunt rebuffed requests from North Sea oil and gas executives to include a mechanism in the tax to reflect falls in oil and gas prices, although a future revision was not ruled out should prices slump, the sources said. Hunt last month announced plans to boost the Energy Profits Levy (EPL) on oil and gas companies from 25% to 35%, bringing the total tax rate on the sector to 75%, one of the highest in the oil and gas industry. The government said this would raise funds to help people struggling with increased living costs, largely driven by energy prices that surged after oil and gas exporter Russia invaded Ukraine in February. Britain's oil and gas productionReuters GraphicsReuters Graphics Reuters GraphicsAdditional reporting by Farouq Suleiman.

LONDON, Dec 7 (Reuters) - British finance minister Jeremy Hunt will meet leaders of North Sea oil and gas producers on Friday to discuss the government's windfall tax, three industry sources told Reuters on Wednesday. The government said the levy would raise funds to help people struggling with increased living costs, largely driven by energy prices that surged after energy exporter Russia invaded Ukraine in February. A Treasury source confirmed Hunt would meet oil and gas executives this week. Benchmark Brent oil prices traded below $80 a barrel, the lowest since January and far below a spike well above $100 shortly after the Ukraine war began. Natural gas prices remain above their historical average .

PRICE FLOORNeither climate campaigners nor the industry are happy with the new windfall tax. Benchmark Brent oil prices are trading above $80 a barrel, far below a spike well above $100 shortly after the Ukraine war began. Jacques Tohme, director and founder of Tailwind, a North Sea producer, said he did not object to a higher tax but a lack of stable rules created the risk of "flight of investment" from the North Sea. "We're happy to pay higher tax, but we need a floor of $75 to $100 a barrel above which a true windfall tax can be applied," Tohme said. Companies including Shell (SHEL.L) and Equinor have already said they will review their North Sea investments.

☆ S&P Global plans to sell engineering solutions business
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-30 | by ( Shadia Nasralla | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

Nov 30 (Reuters) - S&P Global Inc (SPGI.N) plans to sell its engineering solutions business and has confidentially engaged with several prospective buyers, the market intelligence and ratings agency said on Wednesday. The decision to sell the unit follows S&P Global's $44 billion acquisition of data firm IHS Markit earlier this year. The engineering solutions division serves more than 6,000 customers globally. S&P Global reported a 37% rise in revenue in the third quarter due to the inclusion of IHS Markit's businesses. The engineering solutions unit accounted for 3.3% of its parent's total revenue during the quarter.

☆ Exclusive: Ex-Tiger Global partner John Curtius to raise $1 billion for new venture capital fund -source
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-30 | by ( Krystal Hu | Shadia Nasralla | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

Nov 30 (Reuters) - John Curtius, a former partner at investment firm Tiger Global, is in talks with institutional investors to raise $1 billion for his new venture fund Cedar Investment Management, a person familiar with the matter told Reuters. The fund will focus on investing in early stage enterprise software companies in the United States and Europe, the source added, requesting anonymity while discussing private matters. If closed, the fund will likely be one of the largest new funds raised by first-time fund managers amid a slowing venture capital market. Curtius joined Tiger from Elliott Management in 2017 and had been running enterprise software investment at the prolific tech investment firm that has $125 billion in asset under management. His portfolio of tech companies includes security software SentinelOne (S.N) and unicorns such as data infrastructure firm Databricks and cybersecurity company Snyk.

LONDON, Nov 30 (Reuters) - Eni (ENI.MI) is in preliminary talks to buy private-equity backed gas and oil producer Neptune Energy for around $5 billion -$6 billion, a source with knowledge of the matter said on Wednesday, adding that no official bid had been submitted. Neptune produces around 130,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day (boed), three-quarters of which is gas. It has operations in Norway - home to Eni's Var unit - Britain, Indonesia - where Neptune shares licences with Eni - Algeria, the Netherlands and elsewhere. A banking source confirmed talks had taken place in recent weeks, but that the outcome was "far from guaranteed" as valuations differed. Eni and Neptune declined to comment.

Summary Brent, WTI fall for third consecutive weekEU delays talks on Russian oil price cap until next weekPoland seeks German support for EU sanctions on pipelineNEW YORK, Nov 25 (Reuters) - Oil prices fell 2% on Friday in thin market liquidity, closing a week marked by worries about Chinese demand and haggling over a Western price cap on Russian oil. Brent crude futures settled down $1.71, or 2%, to trade at $83.63 a barrel, having retraced some earlier gains. U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures were down $1.66, or 2.1%, at $76.28 a barrel. This is starting to hit fuel demand, with traffic drifting down and implied oil demand around 1 million barrels per day lower than average, an ANZ note showed. Meanwhile, G7 and European Union diplomats have been discussing a Russian oil price cap between $65 and $70 a barrel, but an agreement has still not been reached.

☆ Energy trader Gunvor expands leadership team
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-24 | by ( Julia Payne | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

Companies Gunvor Group Ltd FollowLONDON, Nov 24 (Reuters) - Geneva-based energy trader Gunvor Group has widened its executive committee to 14 people including its chief executive, reflecting the growing importance of gas trading for the firm, the company’s website showed on Thursday. Gunvor has a separate company, Nyera, set up in 2021 to invest in renewable energy sources. As one of the world's top five oil traders, the company traded about 3.1 million barrels per day of oil last year. It posted a record profit in 2021 and a record first half of this year on the back of record energy price volatility. The leadership changes also come amid talks with Abu Dhabi National Oil company (ADNOC) to acquire the whole or a stake in Gunvor.

☆ Israel's NewMed Energy leaning towards floating LNG expansion
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-24 | by ( Steven Scheer | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

JERUSALEM, Nov 24 (Reuters) - Israel's NewMed Energy (NWMDp.TA) said on Thursday it was leaning towards building a floating liquefied national gas (FLNG) terminal to further develop its Leviathan gas field off Israel's Mediterranean coast. "The floating (LNG terminal) is really where we are heading right now," chief executive Yossi Abu told Reuters after NewMed issued third-quarter financial results that beat estimates. NewMed earned a net $123 million in July-September, compared with a $50 million loss a year earlier. Revenue net of royalties from natural gas rose 28% to $265 million in the quarter. Over the first nine months of the year, 8.5 bcm of natural gas has been produced from Leviathan, NewMed said.

SHARM EL-SHEIKH, Nov 21 (Reuters) - Beyond the headlines from the annual U.N. climate conference, progress in advancing the global climate agenda relies on the behind-the-scenes efforts of technocrats over years. Offsets allow countries or companies to pay others to cut greenhouse gas emissions to make up for their own. But discussions on how to curb those emissions are relatively new within U.N. climate negotiations. The work also deals with food security and the economic impacts of global warming. As the initial mandate expired, countries at COP27 authorised the KJWA work to continue for another four years.

[1/3] German climate activist Luisa Neubauer takes part in a protest demanding climate justice and human rights at the Sharm El-Sheikh International Convention Centre, during the COP27 climate summit, in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, November 19, 2022. REUTERS/Mohamed Abd El GhanySHARM EL-SHEIKH, Egypt, Nov 19 (Reuters) - The United Nations climate agency on Saturday published a draft proposal for a deal to tackle the issue of "loss and damage" that said the COP27 summit would agree to launch a new fund to help countries cope with the cost of climate damage. The draft - which the nearly 200 countries at the COP27 summit in Egypt will now consider, and potentially change, before deciding whether to approve - would agree to "establish a fund for responding to loss and damage". "Everybody was flexible for the cause of loss and damage and the disasters and people dying and the economy being lost. I thank all the parties ... who were not flexible initially but who were flexible now," Kunal Satyarthi, India's negotiator on loss and damage, told Reuters.

[1/5] A general view of the entrance to the Sharm El-Sheikh International Convention Centre grounds, during the COP27 climate summit, in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, November 19, 2022. Kunal Satyarthi, a negotiator for India, said he thought the loss and damage deal would "certainly" pass, and thanked other countries for their flexibility. Norway's climate minister, Espen Barth Eide, meanwhile, said his country was happy with the agreement to create a loss and damage fund. But the possible breakthrough on loss and damage was significant, and "I don't think that should be lost in the mix," he said. For daily comprehensive coverage on COP27 in your inbox, sign up for the Reuters Sustainable Switch newsletter here.

[1/5] Climate activists take part in a protest during the COP27 climate summit, in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, November 16, 2022. "There's still a lot of gaps in the texts," said a spokesperson for Britain's COP26 Presidency, which hosted last year's climate summit in Glasgow. EU climate policy chief Frans Timmermans said the first draft left a lot to be desired. TEMPERATURE TARGETOn limiting the global temperature rise, the document mirrors language included in last year's COP26 agreement. Temperatures have already increased by 1.1C, and are projected to blow past 1.5C without swift and deep cuts to emissions within this decade.

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