By Ognyan Minchev, non-resident fellow with the German Marshall Fund of the United States’ Balkan Trust for Democracy | The clash between the Russian oligarchic model of economic and political control and a Western-style democratic system produces structural instability in the Eastern part of Europe, which may prove a strategic challenge for the EU.
Mainstream Renewable Power, the global solar and wind energy company, announced it is successfully tapping credit lines to increase its capital base. Mainstream, which is Europe’s leading independent offshore wind developer, signed this week a corporate facility for up to €60 million provided by Macquarie Group. According to the terms of the transaction, Mainstream will receive an initial €40 million corporate loan with provision for an additional €20 million at a future date…
By Luis A. Torralba, in Valencia | Electricity producers in Spain have managed to weather the crisis under the umbrella of extraordinary income from non-recurring profits. But the markets, in spite of historically high dividends, are letting the uncertainty over the pending energy sector reform drag stocks down with a vengeance. Some declarations bring little help. The minister for Energy and Tourism José Manuel Soria recently gave away a warning:…
BEIJING | China is thirsty of energy. It’s the world’s biggest consumer of energy and the second consumer of oil. The world’s biggest country needs energy more than anything in order to keep the engine of growth working at high speed. Furthermore, development and urbanisation plans might put their dependency on foreign resources to the brink due to an increasing need of energy to power its vast urban areas. So,…
WASHINGTON | Second part of our conversation with Colin Fenton, global head of Commodities Research and Strategy at J.P. Morgan. What will be the effect of the closing of Iranian exports to Europe. Will it take a lot of time or effort to adapt European oil refineries to other types of oil? It always take some time to adapt, and reorientation of supply pathways, especially with trade barriers, tends to have…
WASHINGTON | Colin Fenton is the global head of Commodities Research and Strategy at J.P. Morgan. Fenton believes that there is margin for higher energy prices, with limited economic damage. Brent and WTI are behaving virtually like “two different commodities”, as one trader put it last week. Asia, tied to Brent oil, has relatively strong oil demand and limited supply, while the US is experiencing an energy production renaissance in the context…
LONDON | After the earthquake hit, the longer-term worry for both the equity market and the economy was that earnings power of Japanese companies had been severely damaged. But Investment house Schroders released Friday a note saying the worse scenario has been averted. Shogo Maeda, Head of Japanese Equities, confirmed that “corporate earnings have shown, and are further expected to show, a significant comeback during 2011. Corporate Japan continues to advance as historically high levels…