BP in talks over China partnership - FT
Wed Oct 12, 2005
LONDON, Oct 13 (Reuters) - Britain's BP Plc (BP.L: Quote, Profile, Research) has held talks with Chinese officials over a possible partnership with top oil refiner Sinopec Corp. (600028.SS: Quote, Profile, Research), the Financial Times reported on Thursday.
BP Chief Executive John Browne met China's President Hu Jintao on the sidelines of a United Nations meeting in New York last month, the newspaper said.
"Browne has big ambitions for China," the report quoted an unnamed BP executive as saying. "China needs the feedstock, BP has got it and BP wants access to the market."
Top-level talks have been going on for some time, the FT said.
Browne will again meet high-level officials in Beijing this month, a second person close to BP said, the FT reported.
The deal would be as ambitious in scope as BP's 2003 partnership with Russia's TNK, the FT said, citing several sources including bankers, diplomats and oil executives in China, Britain and the United States.
A partnership with Sinopec, China's largest refiner and marketer, would give BP unparalleled access to the most important growing market in the world, the report said.
Sinopec would benefit from BP's upstream exploration activities, according to the FT.
A BP spokesman declined to comment directly.
"We have a number of joint ventures in China," he said. "We talk to our joint venture partners regularly on a number of issues, including ongoing business and future possibilities."
Any deal would face close scrutiny from the Chinese authorities, the FT said. China, the world's second-largest oil consumer, has already raised several concerns.
© Reuters 2005. All Rights Reserved.