Giant

North American natural gas giant Encana Corp. saw its gas production drop 12% from a year ago, as well as its profits, as it turned off the spigot in its wide ranging gas-rich plays. A one-time hedging loss of $266 million and a nonoperating foreign exchange loss of $101 million reversed profits from a year earlier.

Kinder Morgan Inc. (KMI) subsidiaries propelled the midstream giant to big profits during the first quarter of 2013, allowing it to raise the quarterly dividend 19% and aligning it for more than $12 billion of expansion and joint venture (JV) projects across North America.

BP plc completed a landmark transaction with Russian oil giant OAO Rosneft, which gives the London-based major a 20% stake in what now is the world’s largest publicly traded oil company. BP is using some of the proceeds to buy up to $8 billion of its shares over the next 12-18 months. BP agreed to sell its half-stake in Russian explorer TNK-BP to Rosneft for $17.1 billion in a cash-and-stock transaction, which gave it a 12.84% stake in the company (see NGI, Oct. 29, 2012). BP already held 1.25%, and it used $4.8 billion of the cash it received to buy another 5.66% stake. Rosneft bought the other half of TNK-BP from Alpha Group Consortium. In total, Rosneft’s transactions are worth an estimated $55 billion.

BP plc on Thursday completed a landmark transaction with Russian oil giant OAO Rosneft, which gives the London-based major a 20% stake in what now is the world’s largest publicly traded oil company.

Midstream and downstream energy giant Phillips 66 is positioning itself to take full advantage of the ongoing North American shale oil boom by inking a number of deals to increase supplies of cost-advantaged North American crude oil to its U.S. refineries.

The Marcellus Shale’s natural gas volumes are continuing to flow higher, but significant revisions in growth expectations by pipeline giant Williams Partners Ltd. (WPZ) has led one analyst to question whether the “excellent adventure” to establish a major natural gas hub is turning into a “bogus journey.”

The Marcellus Shale’s natural gas volumes are continuing to flow higher, but significant revisions in growth expectations by pipeline giant Williams Partners Ltd. (WPZ) have led one analyst to question whether the “excellent adventure” to establish a major natural gas hub is turning into a “bogus journey.”

German energy giant E.ON Group will be opening an office in Chicago later this year to trade in the U.S. physical natural gas and power markets.

A long-established Midwest gas utility holding company and an international industrial giant are the latest players to indicate they intend to compete in the growing natural gas transportation fuel market.