[Most of this is the usual, although it is more than usually entertaining by being cast almost entirely in the form of serial denials, making it all the more convincing :o)]
[There are two points that stand out for me, though, one at the beginning and one at the end. The first was that "Oil majors are finding it increasing hard to meet production quotas." So the Caucasus, the Gulf of Guinea, increased Russian production, this is all chopped liver? Or is it going to the minors? Of course a lot of that production is in the future. But so would be any new production in Iraq.]
[The second is at the end, which seems to imply that there is no real profit to be gotten here unless Iraq leaves Opec. If it leaves, and its production was racheted up to 7 to 8m barrel per day, there is lots of room to make money. But if it stays in Opec, its production quota is likely to be 3m barrels a day -- and its current production is 2.8m. I don't know what that 3m quota guess is based on, but if it's true, that seems a pretty interesting point.]
Financial Times; Nov 05, 2002
BACK PAGE - FIRST SECTION: Oil groups poised to pick over the spoils of Iraqi battlefield
By Tobias Buck and Charles Clover
The White House has tried to distance itself from perceptions, particularly in the Middle East, that its possible war against Iraq is about oil.
But for international oil companies, winning access to the riches under Iraq's soil in a post-Saddam Hussein era is a rare opportunity. Oil majors are finding it increasingly hard to meet their production targets and Iraq's vast oilfields offer potentially huge rewards.
The country's reserves - 112bn barrels according to the US Energy Information Administration - are exceeded only by Saudi Arabia's. Saddam Hussein and the sanctions the United Nations imposed against his regime have prevented large-scale foreign investment and long-term contracts.
But with the US apparently committed to toppling Mr Hussein, those obstacles could disappear soon.
If they do, some industry specialists see Iraq becoming the focal point of the oil world's next "great game".
With no clear US blueprint yet for a post-Hussein era and international unease about a possible war, oil companies are cautious about showing overt interest in Iraq's oil riches.
Yet some American companies have had contacts with Ahmad Chalabi, head of the Iraqi National Congress, an opposition group favoured by the Pentagon.
INC officials, however, insist that these contacts with unnamed oil companies did not constitute negotiations about Iraq's future oil contracts. "There have not been any substantive discussions or negotiations," said a spokesman for Mr Chalabi. "No one is able to commit the natural resources of Iraq except an Iraq government legitimately elected by the people."
A US State Department official, meanwhile, said: "There is a misconception that the US is trying to orchestrate the post-Saddam oil market in Iraq and that's not at all what we are doing."
The US focus, said the spokesman, was on helping Iraqis determine the needs of the oil industry after any regime change.
The State Department will next month convene the first session of an oil and natural gas working group which would include representatives from the Iraqi opposition and the US Energy Department.
The group, one of 15 set up to develop ideas for a future Iraqi administration, would develop proposals for Iraq's oil industry to be presented to any transitional government.
"We're not going to get into oil contracts. We are not going to talk about how you divvy up the oil sector or the role of the commercial sector," said the US spokesman.
"We're going to talk about what does the structure of the industry look like right now in Iraq and what's going to need to be done."
International oil groups have pursued very different strategies on Iraq, reflecting the varying political environments in which they work.
At one end of the spectrum are Russian companies such as
Lukoil, which in 1997 signed a deal to develop Iraq's giant West Qurna field.
The Russians are adamant their agreement should stand even if Mr Hussein is toppled and Vladimir Putin, Russia's president, is thought to be using his support for US intervention as a bargaining chip to secure Russian oil interests in Iraq.
By contrast, ExxonMobil, Shell and BP, the world's three biggest oil groups, have been more cautious.
"No company in the US or UK wants to be viewed as being too far ahead of the politics on this," says Raad al-Kadiri, an analyst at The Petroleum Finance Company. Indeed, all three denied contacts with the INC.
The fact that some oil companies have been supported by their governments on Iraqi oil has already caused some concern among rivals.
Lord Browne, the chief executive of BP, raised eyebrows last week when he called for a "level playing field" in a post-Hussein Iraq.
But just how big the stakes will be for these companies could depend on whether Iraq stays in Opec. If it leaves the producers' cartel, its huge reservoir of untapped oil fields could be set for rapid exploitation, enhancing the chances for foreign investors.
According to Muhammad Ali Zainy, a senior economist at London's Centre for Global Energy Studies, Iraq could raise output from about 2.8m barrels a day now to 7m or 8m over the next seven years - given foreign investment and technical aid.
But JJ Traynor of Deutsche Bank believes that even under a new regime, Iraq would stay in Opec, owing to Saudi Arabia's ability to "punish" competing oil exporting countries with low prices.
If that proves correct, Mr Traynor says Iraq could meet its probable 3m barrels a day quota from existing fields.
But as Mr al-Kadiri says: "Anyone who tries to tell you they have a definitive view on what the Iraqi oil sector is going to look like in a year's time is deluding himself."